Thorvalla - Cancelled

I don't believe that better press coverage would have led to a substantially better result. Ok maybe if it was covered by the press it could have made twice, or even three times as much money!

I might be completely wrong but I'm assuming that you can't raise a million by waiting the occasional backer to throw in $15 because why not. I believe you need an existing community of fans dedicated enough to collectively decide to help this get made even if they have to spend a lot of money on it. It is pretty obvious such a group does not exist (and I don't believe that the lack of a credit card would stop someone willing to spend thousands on this, they'd find a way)

Such people would have heard about this. They would have given it a good boost and press coverage would have followed - because it's one thing to say there was no press coverage but why would anyone bother to report about a project that was doomed from the beginning from a guy most people don't know who he is?
(And yes, I've seen several people saying how important this guy is and that people should be recognizing his name, and maybe in a fair world he would have been as famous as Madonna, but that won't convince potential backers in this world to reach for their credit cards)

I think you are wrong there. A communtiy helps, spreads the word, creates a surge of early backers, that creates additional excitement, etc. Certainly all things thorvalla missed out on. But I don't think the bulk of money in any larger KS comes from the community - you need to reach beyond that for such levels of funding - and that's why press is all important.

The prime ingredient for a successful kick-start project is the game itself, no amount of press and advertising can turn mediocre product into an overnight sensation.

Originally Posted by Wulf
The prime ingredient for a successful kick-start project is the game itself, no amount of press and advertising can turn mediocre product into an overnight sensation.

There is no game, when most KSs start. At best there's a good plan and maybe a demo. And frankly, if we expect projects to be at the demo stage, we are asking for very specific conditions to be met for the developer - i.e. he has to be able to finance development out of their own pocket up to that point. Possible for enthusiast part time devs, but probably not possible for small studios that are currently on the short leash of publishers.

*The game* refers to its concept and assumed potential followed by development from start to finish resulting in a released playable product - every pledger know this. It would be nonsensical to pledge for "no game"

Not "no game" but "an idea"

Originally Posted by GhanBuriGhan
We can't know if the potential for a million $ was there, but I am very, very sure that the potential was MUCH higher than what they managed to mobilize (1.3K backers, $47k funds raised after two weeks, that's abyssmal). We have seen a number of TB RPG pitches break a million (WL2, Shadowrun returns)

Interestingly, the two games you mention have a strong sci-fi pedigree rather than being generic high fantasy. They also don't have their roots in very clunky, rather obscure early 90's games.

I still say there's no way he could sell his blatant retro stuff to so many ppl as to get to 1m. A little more, maybe, with a better pitch. Say 200k.

Yes, space-based games do seem to be doing rather well in KS. Perhaps it's just a selection bias on my part, but that's an impression I'm getting.

Originally Posted by HiddenX
1 Mio$ / 15$ = 66667 -> a lot of people, but it should be possible to get this amount worldwide.

Major fault: This campaign didn't focus enough on Germany -> Henkel would have had a home game in his own country. (I could only pledge via PayPal for example).
He should have made a description of the game in german.

Very right. Very, very right. He just didn't realize the huge amount of buzz he has created in Germany.

He just doesn't have the name recognition outside of germans. Alrik here will fund anything made in germany

I think it's time for a shrine for all the games that could have been cool and failed:

Shaker
Ars Magica
Thorvalla

Originally Posted by rune_74
He just doesn't have the name recognition outside of germans. Alrik here will fund anything made in germany

The Realms of Arkania series was big in Germany.
The german generation of players 35+ is the generation with big moneybags.
Germany is one of the few countries in Europe with lesser unemployment and smaller financial problems.
Germany still has a big PC-game market.

It would have been clever to target this market.

HiddenX is right.
Plus, it was imho a mistake to use Kickstarter.
Why ?
Simply because Credit Cards are still uncommon in Germany.
If he had used a Kickstarter-like service wich allows simple bank transfers, his money would have doubled, I almot asume. Because Germans just don't use Credit Cards, they use simple bank transfers. nd even PayPal is ued rather by the younger genration, not so much with the older gamer generations (35+), I think.

@Alrik - I'm curious, why do Germans not use credit cards? Seems rather…quirky ;-) The few German Germans I met (as opposed to Germans living in my country) all seemed to have credit cards…

Originally Posted by booboo
@Alrik - I'm curious, why do Germans not use credit cards? Seems rather…quirky ;-) The few German Germans I met (as opposed to Germans living in my country) all seemed to have credit cards…

Not sure, my family had always had one, and I got my own quite early (when I was an exchange student). I assume one reason is that debit cards are so widespread, and you can pay pretty much anything with them within Germany. But I am not even sure what the actual statistics are on this…

I'm not sure about germans but in my country I'm a rare one who is using both card for online shopping and pay pal. For example, one of my friends refuses to use pay pal for whatever reason and will not pay for something if there is no card option included. The other one is allergic to giving card data just anywhere and won't buy unless there is pay pal option. Go figure…

In a way I believe ppl don't want to bother with registering everywhere and then remembering thousands of different passwords as they're not stupid to use Password1 as password on every registration. And kickstarter is, to them, yet another stupid and annoying site you need to register on.
In a way it's not the card or paypal's fault.

In Sweden its common to use your debit card for pretty much everything. I didn't get a credit card until I was 33 years old and moved to Canada. Here I realized I needed one so I had grudgingly get a credit card. I'm very wary of using it though, I still use debit as much as I can and only use credit when there is no other option.

I'd use a debit card more often if it wasn't for the advantage of revolving credit that gives me interest free money up to my credit limit for a month. since I pay it off every month, its a practically free loan. Then there are those that are into credit card debt up to their ears.

Originally Posted by Alrik Fassbauer
If he had used a Kickstarter-like service wich allows simple bank transfers…

Such as? Which service is this?

And how do you do it? Do you transfer the money right now before you have reached the campaign goal and then refund back if it fails or do you wait until the end of the campaign and then accept 20% of your pledges fail because now people don't have money in their account?

——

Anyway, damn shame about the game.

I find it hard to believe that Germans without credit cards alone would have raised 19 times more money than everyone else. We are not talking about a project that failed after getting at least half way through, it didn't even reach 5% of its goal! Its main problems could have only been deep rooted on a fundamental level and not just oversights.