Fully Funded Kickstarter Game Goes Belly Up

So far ive not funded a kickstarter. Though iv a few in mind that I plan to in time. Those projects however have all been at a more professional level with well practiced and proven studios who know how to manage a project, staff time and budget.

Generally the largere multi million KS funds.

This is why I want to watch and wait and pledge when details are more available.
 
The first of many probably. It often seems like a lot of people think that once they have given their money it is a guaranteed return. This just goes to show it isn't.

Edit: lol, run by an ex Cryptic employee? The people who paid into that deserve to lose their money if they were that stupid tbh.
 
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It's inevitable that it was going to happen given it's very nature, there's a reason studios don't back these games after all.

It's also the reason why Kickstarter isn't the Googlesend for gaming a lot of people believe it to be. Sure it's nice that we can have new games by our old heroes but it's unlikely to be a hub of innovation due to the unknown quantity of the people involved. A lot of games will be backed based on the strength of the current love affair with Kickstarter but the honeymoon period won't be long ending when more of these games fail.

The worst will be when a big game fails to deliver or even just flat out fails, a DFA, Eternity or Annihilation. A lot of people will be annoyed by this as they seem to be treating it as a really advanced type of pre-order, it's not.

I know I will only back known quantities and even at that, only for the minimum amount.
 
The problem I have with kickstarter is, Its supposed to help those who genuinely have an amazing idea and drive but lack the big publisher backing them. Or perhaps the chance to innovate without the restraints of uninterested profit investors. (this is where we see the reputable studios who CAN if they want get a deal with a publisher)

But i feel its very rapidly turning into a way to make a quick buck and the real quality is being hidden away.
 
jakspyder said:
The problem I have with kickstarter is, Its supposed to help those who genuinely have an amazing idea and drive but lack the big publisher backing them.

But i feel its very rapidly turning into a way to make a quick buck and the real quality is being hidden away.
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Often a quick buck off a well known product just to pay a wage for a while.

As many know I have been skeptical since the start of these kick starter projects - what I don't like is that all you get is usually a paragraph outlining the project and a short video that may or may not show much if any of the game. You often know very little about the team involved and like Antar Bolaeisk said, there is a reason that these projects aren't backed.

There are certainly some great looking projects out there, I just hope we actually see a decent return from the most promising projects.
 
A 28k game? In all honesty sounds like inexperience (we thought we could do it within a year then our programmer left) so mmm.

Cant see the bigger kickstarters falling for this, especially when they have the big, experienced names behind them.
 
It's the chance you take with backing. I have no doubt it'll be the first of many projects. But the majority are fine, do get produced etc.
 
Thing with that one, is reading through, it lacks the software, so while the hardware's been shipped, it's inoperable?

Software - I plan to release the first version of the software early next week. I still have a long list of improvements that won't be ready by then, but I want folks to be able to actually begin printing items as soon as possible.
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That said, I was more on about games that have come out of development and launched, rather than them going belly up :p
 
Strife212 said:
Why would you start a game kickstarter if you weren't a programmer, it's a joke.
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You don't have to be a programmer to be a games designer. In the same way that you don't have to be an actor to produce a movie.

Great article on RockPaperShotgun about this whole thing - http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/10/19/money-troubles-what-happens-when-kickstarters-fail/

A few of the article commentators have pointed out that the majority of game kickstarter projects are seriously underestimating the funds required to create a game. In this case the target was $25k, which was only going to be enough to fund the team of 4 for a few months at minimum wage. Successful kickstarter projects like FTL have started with a pretty much completed game and just used the additional funds for polishing.
 
More and more kickstarter projects now seem to be things that are already funded and being worked on and just using kickstarter to try and get some publicity even if they don't need the money. The other issue I have with kickstarter is that people should be forced to show their business model and predicted costs of the project they are planning so there would be more of an idea by investors if the project was even viable as there could be a lot of things on kickstarter asking for a certain amount of money with no clue what the actual costs of their project is.
 
ZombieFan said:
You don't have to be a programmer to be a games designer. In the same way that you don't have to be an actor to produce a movie.

Great article on RockPaperShotgun about this whole thing - http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/10/19/money-troubles-what-happens-when-kickstarters-fail/

A few of the article commentators have pointed out that the majority of game kickstarter projects are seriously underestimating the funds required to create a game. In this case the target was $25k, which was only going to be enough to fund the team of 4 for a few months at minimum wage. Successful kickstarter projects like FTL have started with a pretty much completed game and just used the additional funds for polishing.
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No but if you're not then you'd better have the plans set out to get one. As you say the target was woefully inadequate.
 
ZombieFan said:
A few of the article commentators have pointed out that the majority of game kickstarter projects are seriously underestimating the funds required to create a game. In this case the target was $25k, which was only going to be enough to fund the team of 4 for a few months at minimum wage. Successful kickstarter projects like FTL have started with a pretty much completed game and just used the additional funds for polishing.
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One of the major catches I'd imagine are all the backer reward tiers, I seem to recall Tim Schraefer being quite surprised at the cost of those alone once the Double Fine Adventure was funded.

This is one of the things I couldn't understand with the Defence Grid 2 Kickstarter, the rewards they were offering were crazy to the point where I couldn't see how it would be worthwhile (perhaps they were all sponsored by the respective companies but if that was the case why couldn't the companies just directly sponsor the game).
 
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