The Oculus Rage

The Oculus Rift was bought over by Facebook, and people are livid. What started as a Kickstarter gaming project grew in popularity and interest, eventually attracting even the social network giant. But people, whom I have to assume are mostly gamers, are upset with the turn of events. I wondered what the matter was, and why would people care who owns Oculus as long as the backers get their set at their end of their day? But this article at Gamespot helped me understand why this was so.

And the issue is with the nature of Kickstarter.  I have no idea how the makers of the Oculus Rift made their pitch to their backers, but most people would feel a sense of ownership of the product, having been part of the startup project, even if all being a backer entitled you to was the game or item, plus any bonuses for giving more money. Many feel that using Kickstarter was an alternative to funding a project without having to submit to a larger corporation, and is the desire of the developers to keep the product 'untainted', and indeed, we do see some game developers pitching their Kickstarter that way, like Project Goddus. However, I was not involved in the Oculus Kickstarter project as a backer, so I'm not sure if this was their pitch and if it wasn't, then it is not reasonable for backers to be against the acquisition.

Not that it matters of course. Because being a backer does not make us a shareholder in spite of the sense of ownership. When we look at the backing tiers in a project, nowhere does it say we are purchasing shares, and usually, it's just the product with bonuses the higher we go.

And this might be an issue, considering how Kickstarter projects are pitched - 'help us make this', 'work with us to create this'. Perhaps just saying 'buy this' might be better, but since there's no product, they can't say that either. As backers, we should learn to accept the fact that we are just paying for the possibility of playing or owning and nothing else. If we get to give input in the design, great, but otherwise, it might just as well be a pre-order.

Kicking Pains

Kickstarter, how mistaken I was to not have seen the negatives of this particular form of supporting game creation. Or rather, I had missed out some crucial elements when I last posted about this, elements which have now become much more visible as more projects move on to their final phase of completion.

Kickstarter is still A powerful way for people to vote for the games they want created with their wallets, and indeed we have seen how big some of these wallets are, but we are now seeing how some small and new developers (and even some established ones) are unable to properly handle and manage the funds offered to them. There are games that fail to live up to their expectations and promises, and worse, some that are not even completed due to the studio running out of funds.

Understandably, some of these developers lack the experience to plan how much they need, and so set unrealistic goals at the start or as their stretch goals. But even experienced ones like Double Fine have fallen into the trap. Some have resorted to early access or even second a second kicking of Kickstarter campaigns (though most supporters wouldn't be too happy and would really love to give them a kicking). Let's hope they don't promise too much for the second campaign!

This is a risk that people have to take when kick starting games. Some studios are reputable, but as we've seen, that doesn't guarantee anything, though it helps. And what happens when the game is out and it sucks? While some might argue against this point of view, to the consumer, it is much like a pre-purchase, with a risk of not getting anything back. And if we really think this is worth it, it's a risk we should be willing to take before dropping money in. It's helpful to the developer who can see how much people want this, and also for us to get a game which we might otherwise not even get to see.

Hopefully, people can learn to consider such risks, and also do a bit more research before dropping their money in. Also, developers need to be more responsible and hopefully learn from these failed projects. It'll be a shame to see good quality projects failing the funding because people are too weary, and yet, they do need to be aware of where their money is going and who they are supporting.

I'm still looking forward to a completed Planetary Annihilation, War for the Overworld, Worlds of Magic, Godus, Asylum, Star Citizen and other games that I may or may not have supported. Mighty No. 9, I'm waiting!

Kickstarter - Worlds of Magic

Kickstarter has become a very popular platform for old games to get remakes or spiritual successors. From Baldur's Gate styled Project Eternity to Dungeon Keeper remake, War for the Overworld to Space Sims like Star Citizen, old-school games of different genres are getting funded left and right. If you've been looking for a successor to Masters of Magic like me and Age of Wonders just wasn't enough, it might pay for you to look at Worlds of Magic. The Kickstarter campaign is ending in 3 hours, but if it's like most other games, likely there will be a Paypal version going on for a while longer so do check it out.

And if you still missed the link, it's
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/304725524/worlds-of-magic-a-new-classic-4x-fantasy-game

Kickstarter - Pangenic (a new horror, XCom like game)

Fans of XCOM rejoice! Besides the upcoming remake of our beloved strategy series, we can look forward to a new game along the same vein in Pangenic. Instead of aliens, the enemy is a virus that mutates wildlife, turning them into killer mutants. While this plot device isn't exactly original, combining it with XCOM style research and map planning makes it seem pretty interesting. The game still needs more support so do check it out if it's the kind of game you're interested in.

 

Kickstarter page here.

Kickstarter - Planetary Annihilation

Planetary Annihilation looks to be a very interesting project, though the graphics seem to be lacking now, the game has premise. The way it handles inter-planetary battles seems like a combination of the Turn-based Strategy Genre with Real-time Strategy. Textures look like they need some work, but the interface looks slick and if they can pull off Supreme Commander-type large-scale battles, this could turn out to be a pretty cool RTS.

Considering the company already has a game out (Monday Night Combat) and the devs have experience with RTS games, this looks to be worthy of a support.

Kick it, start it.

www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2012/08/21/when-kickstarting-fails/

This particular article reminded me of this post that I have been meaning to write.

Games have moved into Kickstarter territory. For independent developers, Kickstarter gives them a chance at creating and publishing their games without having to submit to the whims of publishers like EA or Activision, and yet still be able to get the funds for game development.

It does come with it's flaws of course. Kickstarter isn't exactly built for advertising games development. For starters, other projects tend to take precedence on the main page; and even when you go into the games sub-category, it doesn't differentiate well between computer games, mobile phones, board and card games and so on. There's also a noticeable lack of differentiation into genres, making hard to look for the kind of games you might be interested in inside the haystack.

Funding in itself is a risk. There's no guarantee you'll get the product eventually. Like the article I posted stated, sometimes it's not because of the person who started the project, but many other things can and will affect the success though the project in question wasn't a game development and that In facts shows how much uncertainty there is as game development is a much more complicated process.

There are projects though, where the games are pretty much in the alpha stage and where the makers actually have something to show people who are willing to help out. The money basically is for the final stages of the project and a form of support to let the developers know that people are willing to buy their game and that encouragement can sometimes be worth more than monetary support.

All in all, it is a good platform for the development of games and also a good way for gamers to show support for indie devs. Kickstarter needs to work on the games section though, and indie devs should try to make sure the influence of big name publishers doesn't contaminate their projects (EA is eyeing crowd funded games). Devs need to have more to show before setting up their project on Kickstarter and supporters need to remember their donations will not necessarily give a return. As long as these risks are taken into account, crowd-funded games have a potential to compete in the gaming market.

Edit: Kickstarter actually allows you to seperate board and card games from video games, but that's about it.