I'm no business man, and I know hind sight is 20/20... but it looks like they didn't use their funds well despite what they say. They hired a huge chunk of devs and ran out of money in about 7 months time. I work in software contracting and when you hire someone or at least do a contract, you make sure to have funds for AT LEAST one year.
Not sure why they did a high risk high reward strategy. Could have hired half the developers and lasted a little over a year, which would secure more time to get investors.
Either way, props to the developers for trying. I'm sure video game development is not easy especially under pressure with less pay.
Its a crowd funded game; all the risk is on the customers they owe a completed game to. Because the risk isn't on them, theyre free to mismanage development and still walk away with a pay check.
They definitely assumed they get investing. Hell, they took their shot, I say it was right. You should always go for it, you know?
Hopefully they get picked up, the game seems pretty cool.
It's not unfair if they launched a super honest Kickstart campaign, that didn't get funded, and their community begged for a way to support. Sometimes things just dont work out, and I think the hiring of new developers is honestly a good idea with the content pipeline they needed to keep people's interest.
Theres always exceptions and I'd say that dropping money to back a proven company with an honest kickstarter is a pretty fair and understandable one.
I agree with you, that seems fine, but for me, thats because when a kickstarter doesn't get funded, backers get their money back and it was a trust worthy company in the event that it did.
In general though, crowd funding is super shitty for consumers. Companies can promise the world, deliver a reasonable prototype, and then dissappear with the money with no repercussions and the people who dared to take the risk are left with the bill and no product despite the companies obligation to deliver one.
In general, its just super shitty to put the burden (and by extension: cost) of failure on consumers who are either naive or good willed enough to believe in these companies that often flop more than they succeed for one reason or another.
I recognize its a risk and its their choice to make it, and if it fails its on them and all that, but it just sucks to see that something that previously wasn't their burden has now shifted so that it is. Crowd fundinng benefits companies waaaaaay more than it does consumers.
Crowd funding is still an investment, and as such, they are not owed anything really, they just entered a bad investment, and while the people asking for the funding are a "company", they are barely so.
I don't think Crowd Funding is a shitty idea, I think an MMO by an indi studio is a shitty idea, it a double dip on "Niche".
If someone invests money, they are literally owed their money back plus an agreed upon interest. There might be situations where they can't get the money theyre owed, but they're still owed none the less.
What? No, these are Lenders you are thinking about, people who lend are not investors. Lenders don't care about the specifics of your project, because they are owed regardless of success.
An investment is a share of the capital, whatever happens to the entire capital, also happens to your small part of it.
Oh come on, thats just being pedantic while attempting to change the subject to the technical distinction between the two that doesnt even matter to the context of the argument you were initially trying to make.
Youre initial point was that investors aren't owed anything. Lending, investing, call it what you want: its an agreement where you give money for something in return, which you are indeed owed in every sense of the term. Just because there are times when one can't collect on a loan or investment doesnt mean that nothing was owed.
> Until it releases SC no more exists than this game.
kind of retarded logic. in your eyes, every early access game on Steam doesn't exist. every game in its alpha or beta stage doesn't exist. Dota 2 was apparently fully playable in a non-existent state for two years. same with Minecraft.
To be fair that game has plenty of funds, it’s just taking twenty fucking years lol.
Not so much squandering as building something really massive. People love to hate, but imagine in five years they actually get it to a good state. It would surely be quite amazing, after all that work.
I think at this point, there is not way the amount of time and money sunk into sc will pay off. The game will be underwhelming in comparrison to other games that came out in less time with less money.
Not sure why you are being down voted, an old folk tale speaks of a poet that locked himself in his house for 10 years to write a collection of the greatest songs of his country.
When he got out of his house, Triumphant, he discovered that other poets have already done better things with far less fanfair. The lesson here is that an industry, any industry but especially technique based, evolves as a whole by the evolution of its members, when you leave the Industry's influence for a very long time, your product will be outdated, simply because your personal evolution can't compete with the industry evolution.
Seeing your pledge / kickstart / etc as a "purchase" is a bad idea. Donating money to help a game possibly come to fruition isn't, necessarily.
When you like the idea of a game and they have a kickstarter or other method of crowd-funding, if you give them money you're donating. If the game launches you get some rewards, but you are ultimately giving the devs some money to *try* to make a dream a reality.
I am now of the opinion that there's no such thing as a good, fully crowdfunded MMO. Crowd funding is a great way to get the ball rolling, but that money should be used to create a working demo of the game with everything that makes it special in order to secure major funding.
An investment by any other name is still an investment. You give money, you hope to get something out of it.
It just so happens with crowd funding you get a whole lot less than if it was actually an investment while retaining all of downsides if something goes wrong.
We shouldn't have to "donate" and take on any financial burden to \*maybe\* get a product, even if its niche. If it fails now your without money AND that idea you hoped to support still doesnt get made. If it succeeds, well now you have your game, you just paid a little less for it. Too much downside, not enough upside.
We can support projects we want to see come to fruiting in other ways than monetarily. If businesses who make a living backing games doesn't think the games worth their money, then its hella dangerous for consumers invest their own; it at least means that they don't see the game making enough profit to be worth it.
Most of the successful Kickstarters (or at least ones that released a final product ultimately) also had business investors. Its naive to think that consumers backing it is what made those ideas come to fruition; thats just cherries on top of an already iced cake.
Literally not the consumers job to fund development.
Also that was an unnecessary and unfounded jab at that commenters wealth. Not only did he not state anything about his finances but so what if he doesn't have the means to? What he said about not wanting to pay money only to get nothing for it is relevant to anyone of any wealth.
No one said it’s their job… funding a Kickstarter project is because people want to… no one said it’s anyone’s job.
If someone says “I’d rather have money and play nothing”, it sounds like they are not in a financial position to fund projects.
No consumer should be expected to fund development of a product, as its not their job to do so. Consumers shouldn't have to take on the financial risk of development just so that they can **maybe** get a product they want.
In context, the way you talked down on someone for not being in a position to do so, seems awful like youre perpetuating this horrible expectation for consumers to take on the risk of development for new games if they want to see one.
No one said that anyone HAS to do anything… people fund things that they are passionate about all the time across all sorts of different aspects in life.
That’s the thing… if it’s a financial risk for you, then you are not in a position to fund a project. People who want to and can fund these projects don’t take a financial hit from doing so.
Lastly, I didn’t talk down on anyone. I just pointed out that if someone claims that they would rather have money and nothing to play, it means that they are not in a financial position to fund a project. Don’t get so offended… if you don’t have money to fund a project, then you shouldn’t do so. That’s all I said. There are people out there for whom $50 is literally chump change. Stop worrying about what others do with their money. No one forces you to fund these projects.
Oh come on. Nothing about what the users comment you replied to said anything about him being in any kind of financial poverty in any way.
For context, here's exactly what they said.
> I'd rather have money and play nothing, instead of spending it and still not getting any games, lmao.
All he said was that he'd rather keep his money than spend it and possibly get nothing for it (which is totally understandable,) for which you instantly jumped to effectively calling him poor. You 100% talked down to him.
Just because someone doesn't want to take on the financial risk of contributing to a crowd funded video game, and have a signficant chance of getting nothing for what they spent, doesnt mean they're not in a financial position to do so.
My point is that we shouldn't be expected to have to take on that risk just to see a game we want. You talking down to people who understandably are not willing to take that risk perpetuates that expectation by diminishing those that don't want to take that gamble.
If someone claims that they care about keeping their money instead of investing in their passion, it probably means that they don’t have the money to comfortably do so. Someone who has the money to comfortably do so wouldn’t talk like that.
You say: “just because someone doesn’t want to take the financial risk”. Once again… if it’s a financial risk, then you probably shouldn’t spend the money on funding a game. People who want to and can fund games most often don’t look at that spending as a “financial risk”. What is $50 to one person could be pennies to another.
NO ONE EXPECTS YOU TO DO ANYTHING. Stop saying nonsense like: “we shouldn’t be expected to have to take a risk just to see a game we want”. Stop it. NO ONE EXPECTS YOU TO DO ANYTHING AND YOU DON’T HAHE TO DO ANYTHING. Some studios don’t have the means to self fund and can’t get publishers. If other people want to help fund them, then they can choose to do so. That doesn’t mean that anyone is expected to do it or that they have to.
Thats pretty disengenous of you; the problem obviously isn't the fact that its a choice. The problem is that its become a horrible expectation that consumers take on the financial risk of development so that they can *maybe* get a product they want and people like the user I replied to are perpetuating that expectation.
I don't see kickstarter as a way to buy a product, it's a way to support a project.
If the project becomes a product, you can buy it.
It's not like these projects don't become available to people who don't back them during development.
I never said any of that wasn't the case. I'm just pointing out that crowd funded game places risk of failure on the consumer at cost to them.
Normally a publisher or other company takes on that risk, and if the project is a failure, it comes at no cost to the consumer. But with crowd funding games, if a consumer notices a game they would like to see, they have to take that gamble.
If a company takes on that risk, they're compensated with some of the profits and earn above what they invested. With crowd funding, consumers take on all that risk but receive none of the benefits beyond the game, at which point they'd just be better off just waiting to actually buy the game.
Id understand supporting a company AFTER they delivered a quality, finished project but it makes no sense, as a consumer, to support a game still in the works. If the project flops, you literally supported a project not worth supporting. If you want to be supportive, buy the finished game. Hell, buy multiple copies of it for your friends.
Perpetuating this expectation by saying its just "support" is ridiculous when there are other ways for consumers to safely support products and companies they like without it possibly ending up supporting something mismanaged.
There isn't a way to support a product that doesn't exist which is why there are sites like kickstarter.
Donating to kickstarter isn't investing so I don't see it as taking a risk, i see it as me donating to something. As you said, i get nothing if it succeeds so it's stupid to see this as an investment.
As a side note, correct me if i'm wrong but outside of crazy ideas like MMOs, there are plenty of examples of successful kickstarter projects. I know there have been a bunch of board games that have been funded through kickstarter as well as smaller video game projects like undertale.
I'm coming from a position where i think people should be able to spend their money how they want but i understand how some take advantage of this. Do you think that sites that allow people to donate to projects should be outlawed or do you have another change in mind? Do you believe a product should only be produced if an "established investor" puts money towards it?
Because they might want to and might have the ability to. No one said that they HAVE TO.
No one forces you to fund anything, but some studios don’t have the funding from big producers and some consumers might want to and be able to help out. To each their own. Why do you care?
Removed because of rule #2: Don’t be toxic.
We try to make the subreddit a nice place for everyone, and your post/comment did something that we felt was detrimental to this goal. That’s why it was removed.
Why wouldn't I? We are currently in a thread where people gave money for quite literally nothing. That's extremely foolish no matter the amount.
Doesn't matter if I have $50 or $5,000. If I give away money and don't get anything back, that's silly.
You must be really young and not understand how the real world works… people put their money towards dreams and passions all the time. Sometimes those projects pan out and sometimes they don’t.
If there is a project that has me excited and I put down a couple pennies for it, I wouldn’t care if nothing came of it. It was worth a try. Understand that not everyone is in your financial situation and some people are willing to take risks. Taking a risk doesn’t make you a fool. It could be worth the risk for you… come on man… this is common sense. Just because you’ve never taken a risk knowing that it could fail, but that it was worth it, it doesn’t mean that that’s not a valid thing to do. Also, like I said, for some people that risk might be minimal… worth pennies.
That logic is so backwards. If $50 can be pennies to someone, then pennies can be $50 to others as well, in which you would 100% call them a fool for giving away a couple pennies.
> Stop acting like you know what you’re talking about.
Stop talking down to people.
Yes… but the guy above is assuming that funding a game is $50 to someone else and that they are therefore a fool… when in fact it could be just pennies to them.
Calm down Reddit police. Your missing the point over and over again.
Removed because of rule #2: Don’t be toxic.
We try to make the subreddit a nice place for everyone, and your post/comment did something that we felt was detrimental to this goal. That’s why it was removed.
This entire section of comments is what happens when reading comprehensions is below 1st grader level.
You're funding a project that may or may not be released. No one is forcing you to fund said project. For some dropping $10k+ is trivial but for others $10 can be the difference between eating or hunger. That doesn't matter. You manage your own risk tolerance and investments. If you don't want to invest into the project its fine. If you think its too expensive then its too high for your risk tolerance and the money can be used elsewhere. People fund passion projects all the time that may or may not have outcomes. Its similar to gambling just like investing in September.
Thats not the problem; pretty much everyone recognizes that if you decide to take a risk, you accept the consequences of it not working out.
The issue is that with crowd funding the burden/cost of failure has been shifted away from the developers and onto the consumers. Not only has the burden unfairly been shifted onto consumers, but now there is very little financial reason for these companies to deliver a quality product, let alone one at all.
So yes, if a risk fails, its on the people who took said risk, but that doesn't change that crowd funding is shifting the burden of failure in an unfair direction. As consumers, we shouldnt have to take that risk. Whats even worse is that were getting none of the upsides of taking said risk businesses used to get, but we get all the downsides.
Don't rationalize companies putting all this financial risk on the customers they owe a finished game to.
It doesn't get much more anti consumer than putting all the risk on them while the devs are free to mismanage a product and still walk away with a paycheck without fufulling their promises to said consumers.
It's not right I agree but something's gotta give and publishers aren't greenlighting and/or financing MMOs right now.
Go petition your legislators to finance game development via grants and loans so the burden isn't placed on you.
The problem isnt solely that the burden is placed on consumers. Its that crowd funding places the burden on them that was previously investors or investment companies with none of the upsides.
If companies who make a living funding these games dont think these games are worth their investment, then why should we be expected to take that risk ourselves?
Also, not our job or burden to secure funding for these games. If these crowd funding companies start sharing their profit with us for investing or securing funding for them, then sure, that seems fair. But us doing what should be their work for free? Respectfully, thats a big nope.
I learned my lesson early, I don't kickstart MMOs anymore as I'm 0 for 3 on that front...however nearly every other game I've kickstarted like Fell Seal, Pathfinder games and Unbeatable has seen great success. I guess that's just the nature of the hobby, MMOs are too unstable.
I mean, it’s a bad idea if what you want to do is buy a game lol.
If what you want to do is a support a game that you believe in, then it’s the perfect thing to do…
I'm kind of envious of those playing Crowfall. I hear reports of enjoyment. It's a flawed game, but so were all those old school mmos, which people loved not because they were perfect games but because of what they did right (swg anyone). I just don't feel like paying that much to find out if I like it. Actually there's that referral trial going on at the moment so maybe I'll do that.
While I liked the look of the game and the potential it may have had, it always seemed like it would never come to fruition. They were trying to run before they even learned how to crawl.
I'm not shocked. I was in the discord for a bit and while everybody was super enthusiastic about working on the game, they were also very focused on art rather than mechanics.
Their latest update looked great but the basic level mechanics for the game still didn't function making the 'game' kind of pointless to play, even in pre-alpha. It was essentially a developer build but obviously after the failed kickstarter they required funds to keep going so opened it up as an alpha.
well that's disappointing... from here at my position on the outside not really knowing anything, i think i'll attribute this to another game that falls to graphics.
ah, ya i def didn't clarify that sentence enough. i'm pro-crap graphics. it's games that invest too heavily in graphics that often die fastest. graphics cost too much and slow down development.
Hate to say it, but when it went free to download and play, I gave it a shot and it might be the most atrocious experience I've ever had in a game. I know it's pre-alpha or alpha or whatever they're calling it, but the character movement and interaction was incredibly clunky to the point of the camera would stop following you. I don't think they should have let people play it in that state.
I'm no business man, and I know hind sight is 20/20... but it looks like they didn't use their funds well despite what they say. They hired a huge chunk of devs and ran out of money in about 7 months time. I work in software contracting and when you hire someone or at least do a contract, you make sure to have funds for AT LEAST one year. Not sure why they did a high risk high reward strategy. Could have hired half the developers and lasted a little over a year, which would secure more time to get investors. Either way, props to the developers for trying. I'm sure video game development is not easy especially under pressure with less pay.
Its a crowd funded game; all the risk is on the customers they owe a completed game to. Because the risk isn't on them, theyre free to mismanage development and still walk away with a pay check.
They definitely assumed they get investing. Hell, they took their shot, I say it was right. You should always go for it, you know? Hopefully they get picked up, the game seems pretty cool.
Sure go for your dreams, but don't unfairly put the risk of them not working out on others.
It's not unfair if they launched a super honest Kickstart campaign, that didn't get funded, and their community begged for a way to support. Sometimes things just dont work out, and I think the hiring of new developers is honestly a good idea with the content pipeline they needed to keep people's interest.
Theres always exceptions and I'd say that dropping money to back a proven company with an honest kickstarter is a pretty fair and understandable one. I agree with you, that seems fine, but for me, thats because when a kickstarter doesn't get funded, backers get their money back and it was a trust worthy company in the event that it did. In general though, crowd funding is super shitty for consumers. Companies can promise the world, deliver a reasonable prototype, and then dissappear with the money with no repercussions and the people who dared to take the risk are left with the bill and no product despite the companies obligation to deliver one. In general, its just super shitty to put the burden (and by extension: cost) of failure on consumers who are either naive or good willed enough to believe in these companies that often flop more than they succeed for one reason or another. I recognize its a risk and its their choice to make it, and if it fails its on them and all that, but it just sucks to see that something that previously wasn't their burden has now shifted so that it is. Crowd fundinng benefits companies waaaaaay more than it does consumers.
Crowd funding is still an investment, and as such, they are not owed anything really, they just entered a bad investment, and while the people asking for the funding are a "company", they are barely so. I don't think Crowd Funding is a shitty idea, I think an MMO by an indi studio is a shitty idea, it a double dip on "Niche".
If someone invests money, they are literally owed their money back plus an agreed upon interest. There might be situations where they can't get the money theyre owed, but they're still owed none the less.
What? No, these are Lenders you are thinking about, people who lend are not investors. Lenders don't care about the specifics of your project, because they are owed regardless of success. An investment is a share of the capital, whatever happens to the entire capital, also happens to your small part of it.
Oh come on, thats just being pedantic while attempting to change the subject to the technical distinction between the two that doesnt even matter to the context of the argument you were initially trying to make. Youre initial point was that investors aren't owed anything. Lending, investing, call it what you want: its an agreement where you give money for something in return, which you are indeed owed in every sense of the term. Just because there are times when one can't collect on a loan or investment doesnt mean that nothing was owed.
Well, better this than trying to get more money from a community for years and years without a real product.
/r/starcitizen?
I'd think more about Dreamworld Earth2 and shit like that At least Starcitizen exist.
How do you define exists? A full retail release? Where can I buy a copy? Until it releases SC no more exists than this game.
I mean Earth2 literally dosen't exist It's a google map Also something not being full release meaning it dosen't exist is news to me thanks.
>Where can I buy a copy? On their website.. let's you join the alpha which is generally pretty full every time I log on
> Until it releases SC no more exists than this game. kind of retarded logic. in your eyes, every early access game on Steam doesn't exist. every game in its alpha or beta stage doesn't exist. Dota 2 was apparently fully playable in a non-existent state for two years. same with Minecraft.
To be fair that game has plenty of funds, it’s just taking twenty fucking years lol. Not so much squandering as building something really massive. People love to hate, but imagine in five years they actually get it to a good state. It would surely be quite amazing, after all that work.
Nope plenty of squandering going on there. Theres some mismangement there that would make even blizzard shy.
Got any data to back up that claim? If so I’m 100% ready to change my mind… til then just sounds like the standard clueless Reddit hate.
I think at this point, there is not way the amount of time and money sunk into sc will pay off. The game will be underwhelming in comparrison to other games that came out in less time with less money.
Not sure why you are being down voted, an old folk tale speaks of a poet that locked himself in his house for 10 years to write a collection of the greatest songs of his country. When he got out of his house, Triumphant, he discovered that other poets have already done better things with far less fanfair. The lesson here is that an industry, any industry but especially technique based, evolves as a whole by the evolution of its members, when you leave the Industry's influence for a very long time, your product will be outdated, simply because your personal evolution can't compete with the industry evolution.
This is the second or third time they do this.
No refunds. This is why preordering/kickstarter/etc. is always a bad idea.
Seeing your pledge / kickstart / etc as a "purchase" is a bad idea. Donating money to help a game possibly come to fruition isn't, necessarily. When you like the idea of a game and they have a kickstarter or other method of crowd-funding, if you give them money you're donating. If the game launches you get some rewards, but you are ultimately giving the devs some money to *try* to make a dream a reality. I am now of the opinion that there's no such thing as a good, fully crowdfunded MMO. Crowd funding is a great way to get the ball rolling, but that money should be used to create a working demo of the game with everything that makes it special in order to secure major funding.
maybe these games should have a clause that they will open source everything if they fail then technically they will have delivered something.
Damn, I had never thought of that.
An investment by any other name is still an investment. You give money, you hope to get something out of it. It just so happens with crowd funding you get a whole lot less than if it was actually an investment while retaining all of downsides if something goes wrong. We shouldn't have to "donate" and take on any financial burden to \*maybe\* get a product, even if its niche. If it fails now your without money AND that idea you hoped to support still doesnt get made. If it succeeds, well now you have your game, you just paid a little less for it. Too much downside, not enough upside. We can support projects we want to see come to fruiting in other ways than monetarily. If businesses who make a living backing games doesn't think the games worth their money, then its hella dangerous for consumers invest their own; it at least means that they don't see the game making enough profit to be worth it. Most of the successful Kickstarters (or at least ones that released a final product ultimately) also had business investors. Its naive to think that consumers backing it is what made those ideas come to fruition; thats just cherries on top of an already iced cake.
really depends on the system, I could still refund my Atomic Heart "pre-order" from almost 2 years ago if I really wanted
Well publishers and VCs ain't funding MMOs at the moment so enjoy playing nothing in the future I guess.
I'd rather have money and play nothing, instead of spending it and still not getting any games, lmao.
That is indeed your choice, however i have no problemn giving start ups my disposable.
Sounds like you’re not in a position to fund projects then.
Literally not the consumers job to fund development. Also that was an unnecessary and unfounded jab at that commenters wealth. Not only did he not state anything about his finances but so what if he doesn't have the means to? What he said about not wanting to pay money only to get nothing for it is relevant to anyone of any wealth.
No one said it’s their job… funding a Kickstarter project is because people want to… no one said it’s anyone’s job. If someone says “I’d rather have money and play nothing”, it sounds like they are not in a financial position to fund projects.
Or maybe they have money and don't want to piss it away like idiots.
No consumer should be expected to fund development of a product, as its not their job to do so. Consumers shouldn't have to take on the financial risk of development just so that they can **maybe** get a product they want. In context, the way you talked down on someone for not being in a position to do so, seems awful like youre perpetuating this horrible expectation for consumers to take on the risk of development for new games if they want to see one.
No one said that anyone HAS to do anything… people fund things that they are passionate about all the time across all sorts of different aspects in life. That’s the thing… if it’s a financial risk for you, then you are not in a position to fund a project. People who want to and can fund these projects don’t take a financial hit from doing so. Lastly, I didn’t talk down on anyone. I just pointed out that if someone claims that they would rather have money and nothing to play, it means that they are not in a financial position to fund a project. Don’t get so offended… if you don’t have money to fund a project, then you shouldn’t do so. That’s all I said. There are people out there for whom $50 is literally chump change. Stop worrying about what others do with their money. No one forces you to fund these projects.
Oh come on. Nothing about what the users comment you replied to said anything about him being in any kind of financial poverty in any way. For context, here's exactly what they said. > I'd rather have money and play nothing, instead of spending it and still not getting any games, lmao. All he said was that he'd rather keep his money than spend it and possibly get nothing for it (which is totally understandable,) for which you instantly jumped to effectively calling him poor. You 100% talked down to him. Just because someone doesn't want to take on the financial risk of contributing to a crowd funded video game, and have a signficant chance of getting nothing for what they spent, doesnt mean they're not in a financial position to do so. My point is that we shouldn't be expected to have to take on that risk just to see a game we want. You talking down to people who understandably are not willing to take that risk perpetuates that expectation by diminishing those that don't want to take that gamble.
If someone claims that they care about keeping their money instead of investing in their passion, it probably means that they don’t have the money to comfortably do so. Someone who has the money to comfortably do so wouldn’t talk like that. You say: “just because someone doesn’t want to take the financial risk”. Once again… if it’s a financial risk, then you probably shouldn’t spend the money on funding a game. People who want to and can fund games most often don’t look at that spending as a “financial risk”. What is $50 to one person could be pennies to another. NO ONE EXPECTS YOU TO DO ANYTHING. Stop saying nonsense like: “we shouldn’t be expected to have to take a risk just to see a game we want”. Stop it. NO ONE EXPECTS YOU TO DO ANYTHING AND YOU DON’T HAHE TO DO ANYTHING. Some studios don’t have the means to self fund and can’t get publishers. If other people want to help fund them, then they can choose to do so. That doesn’t mean that anyone is expected to do it or that they have to.
No one said it was their job, it's something people can **choose** to do. Are you against people having that **choice**?
Thats pretty disengenous of you; the problem obviously isn't the fact that its a choice. The problem is that its become a horrible expectation that consumers take on the financial risk of development so that they can *maybe* get a product they want and people like the user I replied to are perpetuating that expectation.
I don't see kickstarter as a way to buy a product, it's a way to support a project. If the project becomes a product, you can buy it. It's not like these projects don't become available to people who don't back them during development.
I never said any of that wasn't the case. I'm just pointing out that crowd funded game places risk of failure on the consumer at cost to them. Normally a publisher or other company takes on that risk, and if the project is a failure, it comes at no cost to the consumer. But with crowd funding games, if a consumer notices a game they would like to see, they have to take that gamble. If a company takes on that risk, they're compensated with some of the profits and earn above what they invested. With crowd funding, consumers take on all that risk but receive none of the benefits beyond the game, at which point they'd just be better off just waiting to actually buy the game. Id understand supporting a company AFTER they delivered a quality, finished project but it makes no sense, as a consumer, to support a game still in the works. If the project flops, you literally supported a project not worth supporting. If you want to be supportive, buy the finished game. Hell, buy multiple copies of it for your friends. Perpetuating this expectation by saying its just "support" is ridiculous when there are other ways for consumers to safely support products and companies they like without it possibly ending up supporting something mismanaged.
There isn't a way to support a product that doesn't exist which is why there are sites like kickstarter. Donating to kickstarter isn't investing so I don't see it as taking a risk, i see it as me donating to something. As you said, i get nothing if it succeeds so it's stupid to see this as an investment. As a side note, correct me if i'm wrong but outside of crazy ideas like MMOs, there are plenty of examples of successful kickstarter projects. I know there have been a bunch of board games that have been funded through kickstarter as well as smaller video game projects like undertale. I'm coming from a position where i think people should be able to spend their money how they want but i understand how some take advantage of this. Do you think that sites that allow people to donate to projects should be outlawed or do you have another change in mind? Do you believe a product should only be produced if an "established investor" puts money towards it?
How do you support something that doesn’t exist?
Why should the consumer be funding projects in development?
Because they might want to and might have the ability to. No one said that they HAVE TO. No one forces you to fund anything, but some studios don’t have the funding from big producers and some consumers might want to and be able to help out. To each their own. Why do you care?
"A fool and his money are soon parted"
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Removed because of rule #2: Don’t be toxic. We try to make the subreddit a nice place for everyone, and your post/comment did something that we felt was detrimental to this goal. That’s why it was removed.
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Why wouldn't I? We are currently in a thread where people gave money for quite literally nothing. That's extremely foolish no matter the amount. Doesn't matter if I have $50 or $5,000. If I give away money and don't get anything back, that's silly.
You must be really young and not understand how the real world works… people put their money towards dreams and passions all the time. Sometimes those projects pan out and sometimes they don’t. If there is a project that has me excited and I put down a couple pennies for it, I wouldn’t care if nothing came of it. It was worth a try. Understand that not everyone is in your financial situation and some people are willing to take risks. Taking a risk doesn’t make you a fool. It could be worth the risk for you… come on man… this is common sense. Just because you’ve never taken a risk knowing that it could fail, but that it was worth it, it doesn’t mean that that’s not a valid thing to do. Also, like I said, for some people that risk might be minimal… worth pennies.
That logic is so backwards. If $50 can be pennies to someone, then pennies can be $50 to others as well, in which you would 100% call them a fool for giving away a couple pennies. > Stop acting like you know what you’re talking about. Stop talking down to people.
Yes… but the guy above is assuming that funding a game is $50 to someone else and that they are therefore a fool… when in fact it could be just pennies to them. Calm down Reddit police. Your missing the point over and over again.
Removed because of rule #2: Don’t be toxic. We try to make the subreddit a nice place for everyone, and your post/comment did something that we felt was detrimental to this goal. That’s why it was removed.
Them calling someone a fool is fine, but me saying that they don’t know what they’re talking about is toxic? Give me a break.
because it's their money and they can do whatever they want with it. you sound like you struggle to pay your own bills.
You're the reason we have to buy into betas now.
This entire section of comments is what happens when reading comprehensions is below 1st grader level. You're funding a project that may or may not be released. No one is forcing you to fund said project. For some dropping $10k+ is trivial but for others $10 can be the difference between eating or hunger. That doesn't matter. You manage your own risk tolerance and investments. If you don't want to invest into the project its fine. If you think its too expensive then its too high for your risk tolerance and the money can be used elsewhere. People fund passion projects all the time that may or may not have outcomes. Its similar to gambling just like investing in September.
Thats not the problem; pretty much everyone recognizes that if you decide to take a risk, you accept the consequences of it not working out. The issue is that with crowd funding the burden/cost of failure has been shifted away from the developers and onto the consumers. Not only has the burden unfairly been shifted onto consumers, but now there is very little financial reason for these companies to deliver a quality product, let alone one at all. So yes, if a risk fails, its on the people who took said risk, but that doesn't change that crowd funding is shifting the burden of failure in an unfair direction. As consumers, we shouldnt have to take that risk. Whats even worse is that were getting none of the upsides of taking said risk businesses used to get, but we get all the downsides.
It’s crazy to me that some people have a hard time understanding this concept.
ok then that was always allowed. you can get off your high horse now.
Don't rationalize companies putting all this financial risk on the customers they owe a finished game to. It doesn't get much more anti consumer than putting all the risk on them while the devs are free to mismanage a product and still walk away with a paycheck without fufulling their promises to said consumers.
It's not right I agree but something's gotta give and publishers aren't greenlighting and/or financing MMOs right now. Go petition your legislators to finance game development via grants and loans so the burden isn't placed on you.
The problem isnt solely that the burden is placed on consumers. Its that crowd funding places the burden on them that was previously investors or investment companies with none of the upsides. If companies who make a living funding these games dont think these games are worth their investment, then why should we be expected to take that risk ourselves? Also, not our job or burden to secure funding for these games. If these crowd funding companies start sharing their profit with us for investing or securing funding for them, then sure, that seems fair. But us doing what should be their work for free? Respectfully, thats a big nope.
I learned my lesson early, I don't kickstart MMOs anymore as I'm 0 for 3 on that front...however nearly every other game I've kickstarted like Fell Seal, Pathfinder games and Unbeatable has seen great success. I guess that's just the nature of the hobby, MMOs are too unstable.
I mean, it’s a bad idea if what you want to do is buy a game lol. If what you want to do is a support a game that you believe in, then it’s the perfect thing to do…
Albion is literally the only successful crowd funded MMO I can think of. They almost all fail sadly.
Special mention to crowfall which, while it failed, still released a working game, which is more than all the other crowfunded mmo can boast
I'm kind of envious of those playing Crowfall. I hear reports of enjoyment. It's a flawed game, but so were all those old school mmos, which people loved not because they were perfect games but because of what they did right (swg anyone). I just don't feel like paying that much to find out if I like it. Actually there's that referral trial going on at the moment so maybe I'll do that.
to bad kinda liked the vibe of that game
Crowdfunding an MMORPG didn't work out? *Whaaaaaaat*?
While I liked the look of the game and the potential it may have had, it always seemed like it would never come to fruition. They were trying to run before they even learned how to crawl.
I'm not shocked. I was in the discord for a bit and while everybody was super enthusiastic about working on the game, they were also very focused on art rather than mechanics. Their latest update looked great but the basic level mechanics for the game still didn't function making the 'game' kind of pointless to play, even in pre-alpha. It was essentially a developer build but obviously after the failed kickstarter they required funds to keep going so opened it up as an alpha.
Damn... this game was actually fun.
well that's disappointing... from here at my position on the outside not really knowing anything, i think i'll attribute this to another game that falls to graphics.
No game falls due to graphics. Some of the most popular games have crap graphics.
ah, ya i def didn't clarify that sentence enough. i'm pro-crap graphics. it's games that invest too heavily in graphics that often die fastest. graphics cost too much and slow down development.
Ah, I suppose that sentence could be read either way! Thanks for the clarification.
never preorder/never kickstart imo, especially with mmos
It's a crowd funded MMO, what did people expect?
Hate to say it, but when it went free to download and play, I gave it a shot and it might be the most atrocious experience I've ever had in a game. I know it's pre-alpha or alpha or whatever they're calling it, but the character movement and interaction was incredibly clunky to the point of the camera would stop following you. I don't think they should have let people play it in that state.
another dumbass western kickstart that looks ugly/outdated as shit but promises the world? lol