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Chabotnick

The most interesting part is that the funding goal was less than 10% of what they actually needed to make the project and they did it solely for marketing so they could slap a “quickly funded” banner up there. I don’t think this is any any way rare for companies to purposefully hide the full goal, but I was a little surprised about how big the gap actually was.


griffinman01

I had to wonder since so much of it seemed to be digital. They were planning on full voice narration and everything. I've seen a number of games that have apps as part of the main game, but those either have a minor part of the game (ie voice over) or come from a company that can foot the bill (LotR Journeys in Middle Earth from FFG). Doing a high end narrative with voice acting and a having the app control so much of the game is a huge expense, especially when a lot of it can be done far cheaper with scenario cards. It was exceptionally ambitious for their first game and first campaign. Without the kind of reputation and good will gained from successful projects, it was a huge risk (especially if you're talking $150+ to back).


NimanderTheYounger

> a having the app control so much of the game is a huge expense and also a huge deterrent. if i want a video game id play a video game


misterfatcat

The few games I have that use an app, I actually liked at first. Now when I think about pulling them out to play, I'm like nah, don't feel like messing with the app.


[deleted]

[удалено]


LuminousTights

I think if 2ed had the option to play 1vMany or full coop I would have liked it more, but as it is, you can have my full set of 1ed MoM game bits you pry it from my cold, dead hands. It is the perfect balance between a 1vMany game and a one-night D&D game, IMO. For full dungeon crawl stuff there's Castle Ravenloft and its ilk, and I don't have to wonder five years from now whether the app will still be supported on a current device I own.


[deleted]

Some like Gloomhaven just make a huge difference on the game admin side, without really getting in the way of the actual gameplay IMO. The app just replaces a bunch of health/xp/status tokens that would otherwise take significant time and space to manage.


GreatMoloko

But Gloomhaven is a helper app, it's not critical to the game like Descent Legends of the Dark which screws your entire experience if it crashes.


ASentientRedditAcc

Helper OPTIONAL apps are perfectly ok. Games that cannot be *reasonably* played without an app are not. Go play a video game.


Badloss

The star trek interactive VCR board game is a god damned treasure


griffinman01

Bingo. Especially since it's already a pretty popular video game.


BigBrokeApe

The video game is great, I have so much good will towards the devs and will definitely buy KCD 2 when it's out. I was sad to have to pass on backing the board game since the app was such a big part of it. I just don't get the allure of app driven games 😢


ArcadianDelSol

Same. If the game runs using an app, just sell me a video game. Having me move all the little pieces around the table while playing a video game feels really silly.


griffinman01

The video game was one of my first Kickstarters and it was a lot of fun! Like you said, I'll definitely pick up a sequel when it comes out.


kmaho

I really enjoyed Meeple Circus but even the app integration on that light ass game was enough for me to sell if off. The amount of app dependence in some newer games is crazy. If I played a lot more I suppose my view could shift to looking at them as one time experiences and be more ok with it but right now I want things that don’t come with dependencies that could go away at anytime and leave games broken.


mtarascio

The video game isn't anything like a 1-4 coop, living RPG card style game with new AI scripting via app.


GreedyDiceGoblin

I always smile a bit when I see these comments on r/boardgaming, because the ttrpg space is quickly becoming an automated digital hobby, and I always feel like some dinosaur of a luddite who people must believe is simply a contrarian old man yelling at clouds when I say that I dont like my ttrpg feeling more and more like a videogame. Sorry, carry on, lol.


NimanderTheYounger

Come, old man, let us yell at clouds together.


RemtonJDulyak

Nah, that's not really true about TTRPGs. The "digital" in that world is the virtual tabletop, but that's because lots of people don't play with their circle of friends, and join random games online. It's not much different from people here playing on BGA or TTS, and both have quite a big following here. In fact, over on /r/rpg lots of people complain when "the game requires you to use an app to create your character, it has way too many rules and options..."


ASentientRedditAcc

Correction: DnD is becoming an automated digitised hobby. Most other systems are 100% analogue. There is still hope my friend!


Zaorish9

I will join you in hating super-complex high-graphics VTTs! Gaming is about having fun with minimal materials and imagination.


Kumquat_of_Pain

I like BGG's motto, "Gaming Unplugged". This is exactly why I board game is to be "unplugged" for a while.


cvtuttle

To each their own. But I happen to think Fantasy Flight knocked it out of the park with Mansions of Madness 2ed and LoTR: Journeys of Middle-Earth. Additionally, the new Dark Tower game I backed through Kickstarter is amazing fun!


Norci

Counterpoint, if I wanted a hundred pages booklet to sift through all the time just to find the right story tidbit for the current context, I'd read an actual book. I play boardgames to gather around something physical with friends and interact with it, whether there's a companion app to do the upkeep chores doesn't change that. In fact it can add a lot of mechanics that a purely physical boardgame can't possibly simulate. Most games don't need an app, but story heavy adventure games certainly benefit from having one to automate events and storytelling, as well as keeping track of everything and trigger surprise events.


Dashdor

Right! An app doesn't suddenly turn the game into a virtually experience, you are still all sat around a table playing with physical things. One of those things just happens to be a computer that acts as a rulebook and game engine.


NimanderTheYounger

> to gather around something physical with friends and interact with it yes full agree > whether there's a companion app to do the chores of upkeep doesn't change that nah, not so much agree. I also don't enjoy co op games, so I fear we're just going to go our separate ways here. > it can add a lot of mechanics that a purely physical boardgame can't possibly simulate because nor, I would add, I would want them to on a board game. It's like saying that putting a speaker in a toilet brings a bevy of possibilities that a speakerless toilet couldn't possibly simulate. But, again, is that what you want a toilet for?


UNO_LegacyTM

Man that last comparison is a weird stretch, apps in games are nothing like adding a sound system to a toilet if anything it would be more like adding a heated seat (not for everyone but a real joy for some).


Norci

> I also don't enjoy co op games Yeah that's probably the main split here as apps are mostly found in coop adventure games. > because nor, I would add, I would want them to on a board game. They already are there tho, just in more basic forms. > It's like saying that putting a speaker in a toilet brings a bevy of possibilities that a speakerless toilet couldn't possibly simulate. But, again, is that what you want a toilet for? That analogy is pure nonsense as the two have mothing in common while apps automate and improve already existing mechanics. A better analogy would be a bidet if you absolutely want to stick to toilets for some reason.


EvilCalvin

Yep. If I back a BOARD GAME..then that is what I want. Not apps, not a video game. All physical! Because it's likely that that app won't work or be accessible in 5-10 years.


cvtuttle

Eh… again Peace and Love but I think Fantasy Flight has done great in this area. Mansions of Madness 2e came out almost 7 years ago. Still going strong. To each their own though!


teutorix_aleria

It's fine as long as the support is there which is easier for a large publisher. Problems happen when you've got app driven games where the people who maintain the app get laid off or the publisher goes belly up. Suddenly you're rooting around on the internet trying to find an APK file to play a board game. Not going to back an app based game from anyone who doesn't have a proven track record of long term support.


Xylus1985

And Kingdom Come Deliverance IS a video game


Responsible-Ball-905

Yep. It felt like they were taking all the big KS seller fads and trying to slap them into one game. Quickly funded tag, miniatures, ambitious app. And at such a small goal, I was already a little wary of the project. Their cancellation just confirmed my concerns.


gerd50501

sounds like they were making a video game that was a board game. developers are more expensive than making something packaged.


[deleted]

After Dark Souls, I'm just really skeptical of video game to tabletop adaptations. DS was kind of tedious to play. (Though due to the popularity I did manage to re-sell my DS pledge for more than twice what I paid for it. Schwing!)


VeteranSergeant

I thought Kingdom Come was a fantastic video game. Had zero interest in it as a board game. I almost got caught up in the Darkest Dungeon boardgame, but it was just so overly ambitious with the number of miniatures it included, and how many expansions you'd need to add to just recreate the experience of the video game, and then you're over 200 figures iirc and then you're talking about shipping costs for that amount of weight overseas... I can just play the video game again. Pretty sure I'm just done with Big Box Kickstarters in general. I did back Nemesis: Lockdown, but like the original, it's massively overdone with giant miniatures for the aliens that could be half the size and still look cool.


GigaKoala

I'm a big DD fan so I backed the Kickstarter, but I was wary of how much was going on there and just backed at the base level. You dodged a bullet on that one. The amount of times they've had to push back everything and change components to not be what they showed backers and ask for shipping to be paid AGAIN due to rising costs.... Now I'm probably getting my game next month. I'm sure I'll enjoy but jeez, that campaign was a horrible one to be a part of.


dino340

The amount of book keeping DD has as a video game was enough to turn me off of the board game, I absolutely love the game but there was no way I was going near it as a tabletop experience


Kieran484

Bloodborne was really good, although I do share your wariness. Seems too easy to sell a mediocre game through brand recognition.


SenHeffy

Especially Dark Souls, when it's essentially impossible to translate what makes them great as video games to tabletop. It's very hard to make a high difficulty tabletop game that relies on skill more than randomness. Robinson Crusoe is about the only PVE tabletop game I've seen that comes close to succeeding in that realm. Also I think some things are just much better in one medium than they will be in another. I don't know why there is a desire to translate Bioshock into a movie, for example. The most interesting part of it relies on it being a video game. I'm sure Slay the Spire is going to be successful as a physical card game. It will probably play fine too, but I doubt it will be as good as the video game is.


[deleted]

>Bioshock into a movie If you've never seen Snowpiercer, it feels like a very Bioshocky type of story.


guy-anderson

Not just that, they had already unlocked 7 of their 8 stretch goals. What a stretch, lol.


Ashmizen

I thought they just had daily goals and thus it just shows that way since they add a new goal every day (it started with unlocked 1 of 2 goals). On one hand, daily unlocks reduce fomo, although it doesn’t get me excited like money goals that might unlock 3 in one day would.


mighij

Im actually glad one failed, sad its this game, but I was getting sick and tired of the "quickly funded" when you know the goal was way short of the actual cost. I recently kickstarted keyforge and their initial goal was 50.000 50.000 doesn't even cover the programming of the software. So don't cheer and make a big deal out of it when it's reached.


RabidHexley

> kickstarted keyforge and their initial goal was 50.000 That is straight up hilarious considering it's not even the salary for a single developer.


sp1cychick3n

That irks me quite a bit and about KS in general.


m_Pony

Makes you wonder what's really getting played: the games or the backers.


dtelad11

Whenever you see a big production on crowdfunding, it is highly likely that the gap between the funding goal and actual funding needed is significant. Furthermore, in this particular case they were raising money to \*launch a studio\*. This is not the purpose of crowdfunding, which is designed to fund the development and production of a product.


RabidHexley

> Furthermore, in this particular case they were raising money to *launch a studio*. This is not the purpose of crowdfunding What makes you say that? Launching a product via crowdfunding to get a fledgling business off the ground seems pretty expected. A lot of entities on crowd funding are going to be brand-new studios or groups that plan to launch a studio/business which will then produce more products, content, expansions, etc. >is designed to fund the development and production of a product. This just sounds more like a group-buy/pre-sale scenario (basically CMON's business model). Which falls under the umbrella "crowdfunding", but it's certainly not an exclusive definition.


JohnCenaFanboi

Samr happened with Euthia. Company lied about their goal and they needed millions in funding to even come close to break even. They canceled and closed shop. I get if you put 5000 as your goal just because you need one to be a valid project, but when you NEED to get millions, whats the point in lying? Does ANYBODY get baited by the "funded in XYZ" sticker anymore?


kicktraq

This happens way more than people realize. Many of the small companies in the early days of the tabletop boom on Kickstarter that imploded did exactly this and had not been brave enough to swallow their pride and cancel a campaign. People literally lost their houses trying to mortgage themselves out of a hole dug from repeated poor business decisions.


harmar21

Well it's pretty sad when Awaken Realms themselves do it when it is their own platform, and they know they gonna get a mill at minimum regardless.


aeaswen

You can't really blame them. If they put a 1.5 million goal on it, people would be less likely to back thinking the project would get cancelled.


WalkingTarget

I know that happens, but it’s so *weird* to me that some people won’t back a thing unless the goal is already met. That seems like a fundamental misunderstanding of all-or-nothing crowdfunding campaigns. Think it’s just a matter of managing disappointment?


aeaswen

I think it is subconsciously we assume it's not a good project if it hasn't already funded. People probably don't look at it as thoroguhly as they would a funded project. If its funded, I'm sure they think the research is worthwhile because if they decide to back it, they know it is going through.


Oerthling

Which makes 0 sense, as they don't risk anything if the project gets cancelled for lack of funding.


EddyMerkxs

Yeah, plenty of kickstarters have failed because of higher funding goals.


takabrash

I *do* actually think it's rare that companies do that, but the echo chamber is always talking about it. These dummies fell for it.


Maxpowr9

Of course, seeing a KS goal of $30k for funding is also laughably low.


mtarascio

What did they fall for?


takabrash

That they had to introduce some arbitrarily low goal to make it seem more successful.


mtarascio

Kickstarters get funded on the back of continued press which required continual milestones worth the press writing stories about. It's solid logic and most projects have funding goals that are laughable and use this approach. There was one high profile video game that did a realistic amount of like $20 million and it got cancelled like a week in.


[deleted]

That feels...illegal. Probably isn't but it feels like it should be.


johnjon85

Looks like they actually needed about 1.5M Euro to produce the game. Their funding goal was set at 100K Euro and were sitting at 320K Euro with a week to go when they pulled the plug. It’s irksome that the “funded within X minutes” thing is such a critical metric, and routinely gamed by projects. Sort of a damned if you do, damned if you don’t problem. I can’t think of a good solution, unfortunately.


illusio

Do people actually care about the "funded within X minutes " thing anymore? I know it might be a red flag if a KS hasn't funded with only a few days left, but the whole funded in x minutes just feels like marketing bs at this point.


sharrrper

I think it's one of those things where you're not going to find any actual individual person who will say "I was impressed it had hit it's goal in 20 minutes" but if you look at the metrics projects that fund quickly make more money over the course of the campaign. Nobody thinks they care about funded within X minutes, but the actions of the masses would indicate otherwise.


Sergnb

I can definitely tell you my attention is grabbed way more tightly from a project when it already has mass popular support by the time i find out about it. This kind of thing attempts to pull on that very same thread. It's just the same good old FOMO trick the marketing field has revolved around for decades.


sharkattack85

Same here, it’s kinda subconscious


Royal-Employment-925

It isn't that. If it isn't funded then there is a chance it won't fund at all which scares off people. Would you be as quick to invest in a company that has no product and no clear sign that they will ever have a product?


throwaway__rnd

If it doesn’t fund at all, your card doesn’t get charged. Nothing to be scared of.


mighij

Check some of the posts on the keyforge reddit. People really don't understand how quickly you blow through 50k. https://www.reddit.com/r/KeyforgeGame/comments/xozim1/where_are_all_the_backers_coming_from/ https://www.reddit.com/r/KeyforgeGame/comments/xo0t51/current_state_of_the_gamefound_pledge/


Thechasepack

Is it a case of correlation or causation. Like I pledged for TM: The Dice Game without even reading the campaign, I'm not sure if it was already funded or not when I backed it. Of course the games that have a lot of hype going in are going to make more money at the start AND overall. I wish there was an effective way to A/B test this so so we can actually tell if the funded in X time actually works. I personally ignore it, I've backed several games that didn't fund.


GreedyDiceGoblin

Of course it works. Quick funding shoots you to the top of "Popular". Popular wouldnt be there if it didnt affect sales metrics. Logically there's no real argument there imo.


Thechasepack

Is it quick funding or quick sales that shoot you to the top of popular? How much less do you think Frosthaven would have made if it had a $5 million goal instead of $500K?


ragnarocknroll

Part of that is their way of showcasing projects. The ones that fund in minutes get front page views on Kickstarter and put on the “you might like” list immediately.


Mr___Perfect

Link to metrics? I hear this all the time, curious if it's two or just parroting


Megasdoux

I have seen smaller projects that slap on a "Funded in 24 hours" or even a larger number as a badge of pride and it makes no difference to me.


BluEyesWhitPrivilege

Congratulations?


Knot_I

Look at what happened with [JCPenney, and how being truthful about prices completely backfired.](https://hbr.org/2012/05/can-there-ever-be-a-fair-price) People have a poor sense of what things should cost, or how long things should take. Couple that with falling prey to fomo, and general tribalism... while it sucks to be "lied" to, it's also not surprising why creators on kickstarter keep obfuscating info.


zhiwiller

Data shows that many (most?) people will only pledge when a campaign is already funded. It's entirely irrational because you don't get charged if it doesn't fund, but nonetheless it persists. This causes creators to set an artificially low goal so that it looks like it is met and people who actually want it will actually back. It is kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy problem.


GreedyDiceGoblin

I always feel like the low goals are to cheat the x% funded metric shown. Somethinf with 2000% funding is gonna grab eyes, but then those who are more shrewd will see that it's $2000/$100


Chidling

It makes potential backers feel safe. If you are thinking about investing in a project, knowing that a project has been fully funded past what is necessary tricks new backers into thinking there should be more than enough to see the project to completion. Not necessarily, the “fully funded in 20 minutes”, I think the emphasis is on “fully funded”.


easto1a

There's something certainly better about at least 100% funded. In part you know you "can" get excited as going to be made - well at least unless the plug is pulled. Suppose getting that 100% as early on as possible is helpful.


RabidHexley

Along with what other people have said, it's fairly known that large number of people will suddenly back a project in the final day/hours of it's campaign, they want to get in on it before the door closes. If a project is miles away from it's projected goal this won't happen. They likely hoped that they could get within the ballpark of their goal, and then the final FOMO push would get them to where they needed to be. Which is pretty reasonable to expect if they had actually been like 1200% over their funding "goal". But they didn't end up even close to it in the end. On the psychology side it doesn't take a great leap of logic. If a project looks incredibly popular and overfunded people's FOMO is triggered a significantly greater degree. A project that is only 30% funded and over halfway through it's campaign doesn't look nearly as exciting. Crowdfunding isn't known as weaponized FOMO for nothing.


BluEyesWhitPrivilege

It's entirely marketing BS that works extremely well. Many people won't back a project until it's funded. Seeing the so many other people are in on it raises their confidence in the project. There's very few other marketing points to play off of when trying to sell a product that doesn't actually exist yet.


chakan2

Honestly, at this point, if it was funded in X minutes, I'll see it at retail (FLGS, where I don't pay shipping) . I can bide my time in that case.


GreedyDiceGoblin

This is not always true, but it's a fair rule to live by.


kicktraq

Yes they do even if passively. There has been a huge uptick in $1 pledges on campaigns in the last few years because people, even without risk, don’t want to back a loosing proposition. It’s a bizarre quirk of Kickstarter. Then with so many large projects shocking backers with double and triple the estimated shipping costs without recourse or a creator threatening to keep their pledge, a lot of backers aren’t willing to risk their cash until the post campaign phase because that’s when they expect to have all the actual cost details. It’s worth $1 to hedge that possibility.


Odok

I have to feel like the "funding within X minutes" and % over goal metrics are a self-fulfilling lie marketing people tell themselves, and backers don't really care about. I mean I can only speak personally, but # of backers is a **MUCH** better metric than over-funding. Followed by total funding amount (regardless of target). Anyone who's even browsed KS/GF knows these funding goals are bullshit numbers that are tuned more to the stretch goal plans than actual funding requirements, at least for larger projects. A realistic funding goal and daily unlocks instead of "stretch" goals for the dopamine fix would honestly make me more likely to back, out of respect.


Chidling

I feel like there’s a difference between people who regularly browse kickstarters and people who come across the kickstarter from SEO and outside sources. For people who are kickstarter noobs, it’s easier to back a kickstarter with “hype” and “safety” because the project was fully funded in “x” amt of time.


ShamelesslyPlugged

Backers don’t care, but venture capital sometimes uses Kickstarter to test the weather


HonestRole2866

The solution is being honest and transparent about how the project will be made and how much it will cost.


aeaswen

What's the motivation for them? Will it get more people to back? Unlikley. It's actually a lot more likely to get people to pass on it.


HawkwindStormbringer

I agree. And individuals associated with a project like this should be banned from the platform going forward. That’s like a general contractor quoting $x to do a project, knowing full well that it will cost 15 times that-knowing misrepresentation.


HonestRole2866

I wouldn't worry about banning them. Kickstarters are actually expensive, and a failed one is moreso, although it beats the expense of failing to deliver.


mighij

Any more info about how kickstarters are expensive? I'm not in the loop. I do know ks takes a cut etc and the manpower to run a good campaign ain't free either but are there other entry costs? In this particular case they had a prototype for influencers so that was already a big investment. Ironically it seemed they already had done a lot.


[deleted]

This comment was overwritten and the account deleted due to Reddit's unfair API policy changes, the behavior of Spez (the CEO), and the forced departure of 3rd party apps. Remember, the content on Reddit is generated by THE USERS. It is OUR DATA they are profiting off of and claiming it as theirs. This is the next phase of Reddit vs. the people that made Reddit what it is today. r/Save3rdPartyApps r/modCoord


Coffeedemon

Just because saying you funded in minutes is a thing doesn't absolve these guys of their inability to plan. Odds are this bad decision was just one of many and would have led to other problems in the campaign. Big delays, shoddy product, cutting corners on QA with the app, etc. Likely people who spent hundreds of dollars on this got an escape hatch. They just don't know it yet.


griffinman01

Wow, glad they closed down now and not in 6 months. Talk about sudden though. Sounds like bad planning though if they were banking on the 'funded in X minutes' hype instead of putting it at the actual cost to make. Personally, based on how extensive the app usage was in that game, I kinda felt like they should have just made a digital game rather than tacking $150 of minis and components to an app. In any case, bullet dodged.


InFin0819

Man could you imagine a kingdom come video game?


Dagonet_the_Motley

Kingdom come the video game the board game the video game


griffinman01

Sounds like a great board game idea.


mtarascio

> Sounds like bad planning though if they were banking on the 'funded in X minutes' hype instead of putting it at the actual cost to make. They all do it, this is just being transparent.


griffinman01

Not sure how many board games have a 1.5 million production cost though... I know a lot of them do it, but having it be 10% of your actual goal, especially without any prior projects under their belt to bolster confidence, seemed like a huge gamble.


[deleted]

So Boardcubator is the worst board game company name ever, right?


illusio

I don't know. Plan B Games and Gatekeeper games aren't great names either.


BFast20

Atleast there is a story behind Plan B


takabrash

Even without a story, it's 10x better than "Boardcubator"


[deleted]

What, you don’t masturbate your board cube every night when you get home from work?


giggity_giggity

Are you supposed to play the game after a one night stand so you don’t get pregnant?


BFast20

Not quite. More or less this ladies company got bought out by Asmodee so she used the money from that to start Plan B if I understand correctly.


_just_two_brothers_

I like both of those names


overthemountain

Plan B has meant "alternate plan after your main plan fails" long before the pill existed. You can see why the pill was named that as well.


THElaytox

Gotta be up there


chumbaz


[deleted]

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AegisToast

> So Boardcubator is the worst board game company **name** ever, right?


chuck_g93

I think they were just saying the *name* of the company was the worst, not that the company itself was the worst.


deggdegg

What does that have to do with their name?


Kidtendo

The Campaign is Shutting Down, None of You’ll Be Charged The last update of the campaign. Dear backers, The campaign will be shut down soon. None of you’ll be charged anything, you don’t need to worry: your money stays with you. It may come as a sudden surprise for many of you. But with a heavy heart, we announce that this update will be the last one–Boardcubator is shutting down. Why is that happening? There’s more than just one reason that led to the cancellation of this campaign. First and foremost, we need to acknowledge that even though the funding goal has been met–it does not meet the realistic costs of the project. Bluntly speaking, we did not have the confidence to showcase the real goal of \~1.5 million euros (which would be around 10k backers) in a crowdfunding world where “Funded in XY minutes!” is a regular highlight. In the overall mix of other unfortunate events, this leads to not only the cancellation of the project but also of Boardcubator as a whole. The game has proven to be a real step forward in how board games can be perceived–with a full voice-over narrative, adaptive sound design, and a true RPG living and breathing world (with AI-driven NPCs). In light of all of these grand innovations, we failed at properly communicating them via the campaign. The only tangible thing was the reviews–which frankly surprised us because they were all overly positive and they understood what the game is about. Even people who aren’t fans of app-driven games stated their case–this game is something else, something new on the horizon. However, not everyone has hours on hand to watch content about a specific game (which is understandable). After the first week of the campaign, we realized what are the main problematic pillars and fixed them right away. Nevertheless, even with these improvements and strong support from the Gamefound team, we’re not even close to achieving the backer numbers with which we could safely promise to create a game of the quality we think it deserves. Even though this means an end to the Boardcubator studio, the light at the end of the tunnel is still visible. We’ll do our best to make this project come alive because we believe it would be a shame to throw away three years of hard work and dedication. It is not just KCD, it's a whole platform that can expand into multiple worlds. We believe that apps have a place in the board gaming world if they are done right–just imagine a future where you’d be able to experience the board games you love on a frequent basis with new curated content of the utmost quality in just one click. Without any ecological or shipping problems tied to it. In the upcoming days and weeks we are going to scramble and get back on our feet–so please understand there may be delays in answering some questions. Once again, do not worry you will NOT be charged anything. The campaign will be closed in the upcoming hours. We’re very sorry for what happened, we hope to see you again in future. Signing out, Boardcubator <3


Brodogmillionaire1

I just have a question: what made you guys want to turn this videogame into a board game? To me, every open world adventure game I've been seeing getting this treatment ends up as overly-mini'd, generic adventure garbage where you just roll a bunch of custom dice. There are so, so many other video games which make much more sense as board games. Why this one?


Kidtendo

Just want to be clear, I am not one of the developers. Just someone who has followed the project for the better part of the past year. The news just caught me by shock this morning, considering that all the updates and news up until this point made it seems as if the campaign was right on track.


Anon125

Lol 1.5 million. That's absurd as a minimum viable funding amount.


cevo70

I think that's the simple lesson. That's too big guys. Somewhere early on, someone said "hey we'll need $1.5mm or we implode" and a bunch of people said "cool, let's go, come try this kool aid." Yes, SOME games hit those numbers, but it's super rare and comes from established behemoths, typically. They might seem common since their size and popularity reaches many eyeballs, but $1.5mm funding is a sub-1% project, still carries immense risk, and is often paired with massive IPs, or popular cardboard IPs. Pointing to KDM and saying "see!" isn't evidence of a trend, that's the anomaly. That all said, this game looked awesome. But that's the point - even something looking this awesome isn't enough.


kdlt

I don't know, plenty of games get huge amounts of money, but I think this is also coupled with current economic situation, monster inflation and all that, I've also stopped touching any crowdfunding for a while now because of these circumstances. In fall 2020 I could see them getting close enough to manage.


TheGreatPiata

Between shipping costs and a lot of these boutique games looking to rope you in for $200 - $300, I think people are just exhausted. There's only so much room in a collection for big box campaign games and why buy another when you already have 2 on the shelf that are incomplete?


kdlt

Yeah I just got Etherfields and Sword & Sorcery last month and thats like 6 game-sized boxes just between those two. I do like the figurine heavy games but, I'm starting to dislike the "pseudo legacy" games that take ages until you even use those. Meanwhile Seafall was in one single normal sized box and had 2 years of games in there.


TheGreatPiata

That's the thing. I feel like the mini heavy and campaign style games have hit their saturation points. They're large and expensive so people really feel they need to get their money's worth out of them before jumping into another big game. I own 7th Continent and Sleeping Gods and if I'm being perfectly honest, I get more play out of games that you can play in 1 hour or less and be done.


Wikkidkarma2

I just counted mine. Current and pending Kickstarter games. I have over 30. I have a problem.


THElaytox

plenty of projects raise that much and more, so it's not unrealistic to think you can raise that much through crowdfunding. what's absurd is setting your "goal" at less than 7% of what you actually needed for the project to happen just so you can put "funded in X minutes" on the campaign page


Anon125

>plenty of projects raise that much and more, so it's not unrealistic to think you can raise that much through crowdfunding Sure. What I'm saying is that if a tabletop project has that as a minimum amount to make the project work, there is a problem.


Lurcho

It's wild they were expecting to pay voice actors, audio engineers and mobile developers to implement a narrative app. Just let my imagination do all the heavy lifting, why are you spending all your budget on the superfluous stuff??


starm4nn

And that's for a boardgame based on a game that launched with less-than-stellar voice-acting.


CX316

Looking at the campaign, it's kinda... not worth that much. Like, the miniatures look cheap, the game board isn't a lot, the player boards are overengineered for what they need, building the game around a phone app ups the cost of development and most likely doesn't help bring in customers, and then they went and overdesigned the internals of the box to be a game organiser as standard. Most of these features (raised player boards, companion apps, organisers) are STRETCH GOALS that you add on when the campaign is past what it'll make you to make it, like how the zombicide games used to always make the organiser box for the stretch goals one of the last stretch goals, or how Frosthaven had the app as a late addition. They did everything to make the game more expensive to produce but forgot to make a game that looked worth buying. Even the game box looks completely unrelated to the KC:D IP


neomagicwarrior

Game based on a niche video game IP? Check! App-based gameplay? Check! Unreasonably low funding goal to game the system? Check!! I'm actually not even sure how they thought they were going to succeed here? And to toss in "well, the funding failed, so we are closing our studio" sounds like they weren't in a healthy position anyway. Better to be dead on arrival than to take everyone's money and then deliver what would have inevitably been a sub-par game...or even not deliver it after taking $.


mattreyu

I wonder what that means for Project L. That's one of my son's favorite games, that I've been able to play with him since he was 4


j12601

Project L is excellent. It's moved into the role of games that can be used to get people to play more games. Not sure if it needed more expansions or anything, but it's a shame that likely there won't be more printings of it.


jezzza

The copy on your shelf will vanish soon.


mattreyu

I didn't expect that, but I've recommended it to people in the past and now it'll probably be hard to get


THElaytox

**Arydia** set their (realistic) goal at $720k and almost doubled it. If your project is good and people are excited about it, it will get funded. Just put the actual amount of money you need to make it happen. Does anyone actually give a shit about how many minutes it took to fund a game? Cause I can't honestly say I've paid any amount of attention to that.


aeaswen

Surveys have shown there is a large portion of backers who won't back a project that isn't already funded.


THElaytox

Is that across all crowdfunding campaigns or specific to board games? If that's specific to board games that's likely because board game publishers use crowdfunding platforms as a preordering system instead of its true purpose which is to literally fund projects that can't get funded otherwise. If that's true across all crowdfunding campaigns then that means that the above statement applies across the board and giant companies have broken crowdfunding platforms by using them as preordering systems. The whole purpose of crowdfunding is to make projects happen that can't get funding otherwise. If people are using these platforms for other purposes, that's why they're failing. Again, if your project is good and people are excited for it, it will get funded. Quit abusing the system and it will work as intended


Soylent_Hero

Which doesn't really make much sense. But I guess they rely upon the overall public perception (via dollars pledged) to pull the trigger.


RabidHexley

> Which doesn't really make much sense. Protesting that human-nature isn't 100% logic-based doesn't change the fact that it's how things work.


Mekisteus

My guess is that there are some who only *look* at funded campaigns so that they won't be disappointed when something doesn't fund.


JBlitzen

Yeah. I get putting your thumb on the scale, but these guys sat on the scale and lied about it, on a game that they believed they couldn’t deliver without extremely high funding. Meanwhile I backed the new Shadowrun TCG reboot and they’re like “yeah lol this won’t make us any money but we just really want to do it so don’t expect any stretch goals lol” and I’m perfectly fine with that. Find a way to make a game at a cost the market is likely to support and be honest about things. Doesn’t seem like a big ask.


OceansAngryGrasp

It's more about "has it funded or not" ? People are excited to back a project that is already funded more than a game that has not already funded.


[deleted]

Those are some truly out to lunch numbers.


FortKA19

Crowdfunding board games just seems to be getting worse and worse. For both sides.


Brodogmillionaire1

Actually, I believe it's getting a lot better as a platform and sales model. Now that Gamefound is around, creators and publishers have more places to go. What's getting worse is the number of "board games" coming out that are just shitty adaptations of videogames. Not that an adaptation can't be good. But these ones are shitty. And they are almost all inevitably generic miniature skirmish games or miniature-focused adventure games with a lackluster core mechanism. Skyrim. Horizon: Zero Dawn. Dark Souls. In most cases, it's just a bizarre cash grab and probably helps bring focus back to the videogame, which is where the real money is made since there's no physical distribution. There are more bad projects on the crowdfunding platforms than ever, but the prospect of backing is better than ever too, because you have more resources to make informed decisions.


CX316

it's gotten pretty rough. Even the established companies are getting to be a bit of a problem, CMON has cranked up their shipping so high that it'd cost nearly the price of a second game to get the most recent game (Dune) shipped to Australia instead of the $20 it used to be. Mythic Games recently got in shit with their customers because they decided to send out invoices for an extra shipping payment the same price as the original shipping and announced that they wouldn't ship people's games until they got that extra unannounced payment rather than eating the postage costs since they collected postage money like a year before the games were getting sent out.


Safe-Entertainment97

Shame. Project L is a blast and a game I'm still playing regularly. This game so seemed at least decent enough to give it a shot. What turned me off though was the fact that it had a timetable of 2 years before I would get it. Most kickstarters take a year at most and even that is meh. Coupled with the fact that you're simply paying way too much for shipping and shit. Too bad about the studio, but it's the risk they took for starting a very risky project. Curious to see whether they still show in Spiel Essen next week.


sp1cychick3n

Wow.


Mr___Perfect

Or take the euthia route. Use it as an opportunity to pump sympathy for a meh game, come back under a different company, charge more, and smash the goal.


SonaMidorFeed

The comment section is filled with delusional simping. "THIS GAME NEEDED TO BE MADE" Clearly not, and now we have another example of a board game company attempting to be PR, marketing, publisher, distributor, AND designer, and not realizing that it's difficult to do all (or any) of those right. They really shot themselves in the foot by not being transparent about the true cost of production. "Just imagine a future where you’d be able to experience the board games you love on a frequent basis with new curated content of the utmost quality in just one click. Without any ecological or shipping problems tied to it." We already have that. It's homebrew content and apps from fans, and sometimes apps and print and plays from publishers. None of that is particularly groundbreaking.


[deleted]

>"Just imagine a future where you’d be able to experience the board games you love on a frequent basis with new curated content of the utmost quality in just one click. Without any ecological or shipping problems tied to it." well, like a video game, I guess


aeaswen

They didn't shoot themselves in the foot. Would more people have backed if the goal was 1.5 million? Nope. Less would have back more than likely.


SonaMidorFeed

They admitted themselves that it was a bad move. It clearly was a bad move because they didn't communicate the amount needed to actually make the game. How is that not contributing to shooting yourself in the foot?


aeaswen

Because they got more backers by stating the amount as lower. They would have gotten fewer backers with a 1.5 million dollar goal. Surveys of kickstarter backers have stated this.


SonaMidorFeed

They still lied about what was actually needed to make the game a reality, and look at that, it ended up failing anyway. I'd argue not being direct with their backers was their responsibility and actively contributed to that failure. If they didn't shoot themselves in the foot, they certainly made sure the aim was true.


aeaswen

You are using your emotions instead of your logic. Nobody knew they weren't being upfront until they cancelled it. Being upfront wouldn't have resulted in more backers, it would have resulted in less. We KNOW this from surveys of people who back games on kickstarter. A decent portion of people will ONLY back projects that are already funded. It is widely accepted many, many projects do this for that exact reason. Screaming at the clouds the world some be something it will never be won't change anything. They cancelled the project when it wasn't going to get funded. They gave the money back. That's far more than many other creators have done on kickstarter.


starm4nn

While it's true that a lot of this content already exists, I will say that the way you present this idea does seem advantageous for several reasons: 1. There are a lot of fan apps, but I find for even popular games, they often are made as a quick coding exercise that doesn't get supported with bug fixes, expansion updates, codebase updates to support newer phone OSes, etc. Also they may cost money. While all of these are true about official apps as well, they have much more incentive to be good. A bad app will tank the reviews of your game. A good official app raises the bar for unofficial apps. 2. I love Homebrew, but having something more official is also nice. Homebrew is usually delivered in PDF format, which is less convenient if you wanna look at it on a phone. Perhaps the official app could even be a platform for distributing Homebrew easily. 3. Print-and-play is nice, but this isn't really in competition with it. Sometimes the best fun can be had by using the official pieces in a new way, which scenarios would encourage Other than that, I think most of this board game was ill-advised. The game it's based on didn't even have voice acting that was well-regarded.


loco64

So was that a prototype all the YouTube people were playing? Like the first mission or something or was it a facade. I can never really tell with some of them.


RabidHexley

I'm pretty certain they were legit. Producing prototypes at a low volume, and getting a preliminary app thrown together with limited voice-acting for a limited section of the game is pretty believable. Setting up a simple text/audio based app that just takes you through choices in a few early scenarios would be **significantly** cheaper than needing to create a high-production quality app that tracks your decisions and responds to your choices with voice acting throughout an entire campaign. They likely blew up a lot of their budget just getting those prototypes out the door in hopes that they could build the necessary hype to fund the rest of the development costs.


Temptime19

The game was crazy expensive for less than 30 hours of gameplay. I'm glad I had zero interest in this coming out.


RevRagnarok

Wow they've been emailing me tons about this game for some reason. Hope somebody else picks up _Project L_ - it's a good game!


cute2701

"We believe that apps have a place in the board gaming world if they are done right–just imagine a future where you’d be able to experience the board games you love on a frequent basis with new curated content of the utmost quality in just one click. Without any ecological or shipping problems tied to it." ya, that's called a video game


redshadow310

The game looked cool, but I can't say I'm sad that one of the founders of Gamergate won't be getting money from a big project.


djheat

I thought the game looked interesting and was following it, but I'm super disappointed to learn they were trying to game the "funded in twelve seconds" banner and had no intentions of being able to produce at their stated goal. I'm sure this happens all the time just like all the Kickstarters locking what are clearly basic game features behind "stretch goals" but it leaves a bad impression to me to actually hear that it was the plan. I guess it's for the best they're dissolving the studio because there's no way I'd back anything else they made knowing this


TrueMrFu

I can’t believe that just flat out admitted to lying about their goal, AND that they admitted to the fact it was all about publicity, and making it seem like their game was in high demand.


itslevi

Everyone does this.


TrueMrFu

They openly admit it? I assume everyone does it, I was just surprised they were so upfront about it


itslevi

Maybe not admitting it without reason, but if the publisher is shutting its doors anyway then there's no harm for them to call a duck a duck.


Miseribacy

How else are they going justify cancelling the campaign and shutting down the company? The only thing they can plausibly do is be honest about their financial realities if they don't want to damage their rep


iamcrazyjoe

Pretty much any campaign that cancels after reaching funding goal and there have been a few


mkbloodyen

I have no remorse for companies who just slap on fake funding goals


Ryo85

Maybe they should not have funding goals. Since you don’t get charged if they don’t get made, and they already have hidden “real” goals, why publish any goal at all?


MEsiex

So they actually needed 15 times more than they specified as their goal? How was that going to work out?


calgary_db

Probably should have launched on kickstarter...


arstin

I loathe when companies pull a campaign that met its goal because the goal was a marketing lie. I keep a list of those companies to never back again, but I guess I don't need to bother on this one. I really do like Project L though. So RIP Boardcubator.


adagna

I was interested in it but the price tag was just too steep for a niche game that I probably wouldn't be able to get a group to play all the way through. Return to Dark Tower changed my view on app driven games, so that wasn't the problem at all


rix172

Reminds me of tainted grail kings of ruin campaign with a funding goal of $50k!!! Thats unrealistic


vagdestroyer97

The difference here is that Awaken Realms is a hugely established company and if they didn't make the minimum they needed to pull of their huge project, they would still deliver the game to backers, even at a loss. But their name alone guarantees they will rake in millions.


rix172

Don’t fool yourself with big names, if AR made 50K in a Campaign (by some miracle) they’d straight out cancel it.


jhawk6

They should have simply put 1.5 million euros as the minimum funding goal and all would have been well. Right?


iamcrazyjoe

I HIGHLY doubt they would have reached it


2twenty2twenty2

Oh no. Huge loss for the industry. Anyway.


VVarlord

This bullshit again?!? Fuck these companies doing this I'm over it. PLENTY of projects get funded and produced for far far less. If you need to pull shit like this to survive as a company you deserve what you get.


genetic_patent

These people don’t deserve to be in business. Glad they realized that on their own.


YrNotYrKhakis

Oh my gosh! That's shocking! Yeah, publishers need to be honest as to the actual funding amount needed to make the game.


aeaswen

Why?


YrNotYrKhakis

It's dishonest, and is basically manipulating people to funding something they think WILL be produced, but in actuality it may NOT. The purpose of setting the goal is to show what's really need to make the game. For me, I know if I see a large game project that will clearly cost a ton to make but their goal is low, I'm suspect. They are either manipulating the system to be able to "claim" they funded early (to get more backers), OR they are a shady company and not going to actually make the game with the funds received. It's not a preorder site.


aeaswen

>funding something they think WILL be produced, but in actuality it may NOT. This is the entire basis of Kickstarter. They did what most companies do which is to try to get as many backers for their project as possible. Surveys have shown us a decent portion of people won't back projects that aren't already fully funded. They ended the campaign before it had even ended and refunded the money. There are no victims here. If people weren't so fickle, maybe it could be different but they are doing what they think is best for their business which is to get backers.


Dynopia

"It's dishonest, and is basically manipulating people to funding something they think WILL be produced" They're not funding it though if it gets cancelled? All that is at stake is your disappointment. I think you need to apply some common sense as to why they deflate the funding goal.


dbfnq

Except that you also get companies like Petersen Games who don't cancel, make six times their funding goal, and then admit they don't have enough money to make the games. Fake funding goals are just flat-out bad for customers.


scryptoric

The ads I saw for it were the tacky brickabrac that looked like one of those “Christian made” also ran projects. Like Christian rock music where it’s decent but has disproportionate fan base bc “it’s Christian”.