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Kickstarter reflection of succesful games in production
A lot of people who pledge for game kickstarters don’t seem to realise that it’s a pledge, not a pre-order of the game + merchandise. Every time, someone complains about how they aren’t getting their money’s worth when they pledge an X amount or when they think a physical box is too expensive. How do they think the games are going to get made if all the money is spent on producing rewards?
Once some of these bigger projects are over, it would be interesting to know how much of the total amount of money was spent on rewards. It might help future projects plan their finances a little better.
Once some of these bigger projects are over, it would be interesting to know how much of the total amount of money was spent on rewards. It might help future projects plan their finances a little better.
On Double Fines case we already know: they used 473k on rewards, which is more than the original budget of the game. Kind of insane. The figure includes manufacturing, shipping and what not. I seem to recall that inXile said their figure was also around the same numbers. Or maybe I’m thinking something else.
On Double Fines case we already know: they used 473k on rewards, which is more than the original budget of the game. Kind of insane. The figure includes manufacturing, shipping and what not. I seem to recall that inXile said their figure was also around the same numbers. Or maybe I’m thinking something else.
Oh.My.God.
That is insane. Did they anticipate such high costs before the campaign launched?
DF said, that they kept tracking the reward costs, so the figure didn’t come as a surprise for them. They consider it a good investmen on how much money they got after the rewards and KS/Amazon costs. Both, KS and Amazon actually get about 5% each of the collected money.
That’s always been one of my concerns, how much money actually makes it to the game and how many copies do you think you will sell at the end when most of your biggest fans are already getting a copy thanks to rewards?
3.5 time winner of the “Really Annoying Caption Contest Saboteur” Award!
A lot of people who pledge for game kickstarters don’t seem to realise that it’s a pledge, not a pre-order of the game + merchandise.
Which seems crazy to me, because who would pre-order from a place that made them pay a year before the game exists? If all you want to do is buy games, Kickstarter doesn’t seem like a very good place to do it.
I think a good way to look at it is as a microinvestment, where the pay-off is a potentially good game. It’s not quite a gift; people do it for more than just kindness, but there’s an accepted risk involved. If you’re an investor, you accept that not every investment will yield a good return, but you still want to keep an eye on it and make sure that the best efforts are being made.
how many copies do you think you will sell at the end when most of your biggest fans are already getting a copy thanks to rewards?
I wouldn’t worry about it if I were you. Look at the figures of non-KS games like Machinarium and Botanicula. Hundreds of thousands of copies, thanks to HumbleBundle, Steam and GOG. The bigger KS projects will have no problems anyway. A company like DF usually sells many hundreds of thousands copies and they had only 88,000 kickstarter backers! You really think Dreamfall Chapters will not sell more than 22,000 copies? Same goes for smaller companies on a smaller scale. Tex only 7000 backers, Jane 6000. One of my favorites, Lilly Looking Through, had no more than 1600 backers. It looks terrific, I’m sure their game will be a success.
Now playing: ——-
Recently finished: don’t remember
Up next: Eh…
Looking forward to: Ithaka of the Clouds; The Last Crown; all the kickstarter adventure games I supported
Easily the best thing abut KS funding is, that after you’ve done with the game every sale is pretty much proft, especially if the amount you got was enough to cover the whole production. In that sense every KS game is in a very different position, as the initial costs of making the game have already been coverd, so you are left with advertisement other promotion and even those costs can be minimal, as inXile for an example has got again a lot of coverage with Torment KS and the coverage remembers to remind that Wasteland 2 is in production and in good shape.
...thanks to HumbleBundle, Steam and GOG…
That is a very good point,
...after you’ve done with the game every sale is pretty much proft…
and there’s another!
I keep forgetting that you don’t need to sell physical copies at £40 a throw nowadays to make money.
However, I do hope that developers like JJ, Revolution etc. make enough money from the sales of the finished products to at least part fund the next one. Something tells me that if the best they can do is break even, they may not do as well in another Kickstarter for another game afterwards (although this would still depend on the quality of the finished product to some extent) if they want the full amount. If a smaller “top up” sum would do it then things will look better for the future of these companies/developers.
3.5 time winner of the “Really Annoying Caption Contest Saboteur” Award!
how many copies do you think you will sell at the end when most of your biggest fans are already getting a copy thanks to rewards?
I wouldn’t worry about it if I were you. Look at the figures of non-KS games like Machinarium and Botanicula. Hundreds of thousands of copies, thanks to HumbleBundle, Steam and GOG. The bigger KS projects will have no problems anyway. A company like DF usually sells many hundreds of thousands copies and they had only 88,000 kickstarter backers! You really think Dreamfall Chapters will not sell more than 22,000 copies? Same goes for smaller companies on a smaller scale. Tex only 7000 backers, Jane 6000. One of my favorites, Lilly Looking Through, had no more than 1600 backers. It looks terrific, I’m sure their game will be a success.
Yeah, I think this is spot-on. It’s actually a pretty small segment of the total market that is willing to back something on Kickstarter. A successful KS also ends up being a pretty powerful promotional tool, too, so I think most of these games will do very well, at least if they turn out to be any good.
On the other hand, the Kickstarter funds are not enough for Pinkerton, Big Finish and Ragnar. They needed (angel) investors too. But I’m still sure they know what they’re doing. 
Now playing: ——-
Recently finished: don’t remember
Up next: Eh…
Looking forward to: Ithaka of the Clouds; The Last Crown; all the kickstarter adventure games I supported
No, the original pitch was that she would create three games during one “cycle” and on certain level you’d get them all. The vote was done because the whole system felt too confusing from most, me included. And that’s why on certain level you get also the MGX.
No. The vote was to choose the primary adventure funded at $300k. The second game was Lola and Lucy thrown in as a bonus. If they made $600k they would have done a third game (second adventure). This was made very clear in the beginning of the campaign.
Later on, when Jane got the MGX deal, she was able to offer it as a reward to backers at $50 and above (or they could get the game at a lower pledge instead of Moebius). But all the kickstarter funds were going into Moebius.
The voting was straightforward. The only people who didn’t understand it were those who didn’t want to. Pretty clear. Vote for favorite game, that game gets developed.
No. The vote was to choose the primary adventure funded at $300k. The second game was Lola and Lucy thrown in as a bonus. If they made $600k they would have done a third game (second adventure). This was made very clear in the beginning of the campaign.
Later on, when Jane got the MGX deal, she was able to offer it as a reward to backers at $50 and above (or they could get the game at a lower pledge instead of Moebius). But all the kickstarter funds were going into Moebius.
The voting was straightforward. The only people who didn’t understand it were those who didn’t want to. Pretty clear. Vote for favorite game, that game gets developed.
My understantment of Jensens original pitch still remains the same. She originally pitched a “cycle of games”, originally not even named. The vote came to when a lot of people voiced that they were unsure of what the deal actually was. So Jensen then presented the ideas she had for the game cycle. Had she collected enough money, 50+ backers would have gotten all those games. When that didn’t happen she managed to make a deal with MGX publisher, that it would be part of her original deal. You can even read the original 50 dollar description from the KS site. That MGX wasn’t even in the picture when Jensesn KS started.
My understantment of Jensens original pitch still remains the same. She originally pitched a “cycle of games”, originally not even named. The vote came to when a lot of people voiced that they were unsure of what the deal actually was. So Jensen then presented the ideas she had for the game cycle. Had she collected enough money, 50+ backers would have gotten all those games. When that didn’t happen she managed to make a deal with MGX publisher, that it would be part of her original deal. You can even read the original 50 dollar description from the KS site. That MGX wasn’t even in the picture when Jensesn KS started.
couple wrong things there.. The original plan was: backers would get 1 game if the funding was met, a second adventure at the 50 dollar level if funding reached 600k. (getting moebius+gm2+anglophile all in one cycle was never a possibility). Voting was always planned, but the time of the vote was moved forward when funding slowed down.
(note: im not counting lola and lucy here cuz i have trouble caring about it at all, lol)
My understantment of Jensens original pitch still remains the same. She originally pitched a “cycle of games”, originally not even named. The vote came to when a lot of people voiced that they were unsure of what the deal actually was. So Jensen then presented the ideas she had for the game cycle. Had she collected enough money, 50+ backers would have gotten all those games. When that didn’t happen she managed to make a deal with MGX publisher, that it would be part of her original deal. You can even read the original 50 dollar description from the KS site. That MGX wasn’t even in the picture when Jensesn KS started.
You’re just making shit up at this point. And she always made it clear the games would be voted on during the campaign. The MGX deal was separate from the kickstarter. The timing was coincidental. Funding was never meant for MGX, and it was made clear it was only for the CSG game.
It sounds like you didn’t even follow the campaign and are looking at the final result and making up your own narrative.
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