Bard's Tale IV - Final Hours

Myrthos

Myrthos

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The Kickstarter campaign for The Bard's Tale IV is in its final hours, with just 14 hours to go at this point in time.

Including the Paypal donations, the 1.5 million stretch goal has been reached, but the stretch goal for having MCA designing anything in the game (1.9 million) appears to be out of reach.

More information.
 
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Funny... in other times it would be an easily achieved stretch, but even the project kinda struggled to reach its own pledge goal ($ 1,250,000).

And then, most of stretch goals are only dungeons and dungeons and...

What intrigues me most is a piece of $ 1,9 M stretch: "Visible equipment on character in inventory added". What does this mean ? Let's see if I correctly understood that by means of example: should this stretch can't be reached, then if I equip a plate mail on my char that mail won't be displayed onscreen ????
 
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henriquejr said:
Funny… in other times it would be an easily achieved stretch, but even the project kinda struggled to reach its own pledge goal ($ 1,250,000).

And then, most of stretch goals are only dungeons and dungeons and…

What intrigues me most is a piece of $ 1,9 M stretch: "Visible equipment on character in inventory added". What does this mean ? Let's see if I correctly understood that by means of example: should this stretch can't be reached, then if I equip a plate mail on my char that mail won't be displayed onscreen ????
Click to expand...

For every piece of visible equipment you wear they would need to hire a concept artist(s), who can draw good looking armor - fast possibly before 2017 or EoW-. Hire another talented artist who can create a high-detail mesh, based on the concept,.. and texture the equipment, so it looks like the beautiful concept and looks good in Unreal Engine too. Spending many hours on animation as well = animator hired, then you multiply this time+salary for:
plate mail type-1 plate mail type-2 plate mail type-3….
Chainmail type-1 Chainmail type-2 Chainmail type-3….
banded mail 12 3
leather armor 123
helmets hats 123….
gloves 123456
boots 123456
pants 123456
swords , axes, maces, clubs, daggers gazillion types

Add a nice TIME MULTIPLIER per equipment piece = add everything up , 1 equipment is made during x times days, x times weeks - and the Game will be this late.

If you also want cloaks visible, then a Cloaks-Team needs to agonize over making animated cloaks looking good in Unreal Engine and moving cloth not getting in the way, when characters swinging their weapons.

For this you need: lots of talented workers = artists who need lots of money to do visible equipment that doesn't look ugly, but rather attractive. Its always hard to create something nice.
 
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henriquejr said:
Funny… in other times it would be an easily achieved stretch, but even the project kinda struggled to reach its own pledge goal ($ 1,250,000).

And then, most of stretch goals are only dungeons and dungeons and…

What intrigues me most is a piece of $ 1,9 M stretch: "Visible equipment on character in inventory added". What does this mean ? Let's see if I correctly understood that by means of example: should this stretch can't be reached, then if I equip a plate mail on my char that mail won't be displayed onscreen ????
Click to expand...

I'm guessing the mail will be displayed on screen as a picture, but you won't see the character wearing it
 
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mercy said:
For every piece of visible equipment you wear they would need to hire a concept artist(s), who can draw good looking armor - fast possibly before 2017 or EoW-. Hire another talented artist who can create a high-detail mesh, based on the concept,.. and texture the equipment, so it looks like the beautiful concept and looks good in Unreal Engine too. Spending many hours on animation as well = animator hired, then you multiply this time+salary for:
plate mail type-1 plate mail type-2 plate mail type-3….
Chainmail type-1 Chainmail type-2 Chainmail type-3….
banded mail 12 3
leather armor 123
helmets hats 123….
gloves 123456
boots 123456
pants 123456
swords , axes, maces, clubs, daggers gazillion types

Add a nice TIME MULTIPLIER per equipment piece = add everything up , 1 equipment is made during x times days, x times weeks - and the Game will be this late.

If you also want cloaks visible, then a Cloaks-Team needs to agonize over making animated cloaks looking good in Unreal Engine and moving cloth not getting in the way, when characters swinging their weapons.

For this you need: lots of talented workers = artists who need lots of money to do visible equipment that doesn't look ugly, but rather attractive. Its always hard to create something nice.
Click to expand...

Mercy,

But do they need to add this as a stretch goal ???

I don't mean to be harsh. I backed this game and all and I know everything is money, but Fallout 1 & 2 (among other games) already did this back in 1990's. I think it's a weird stretch goal ! I don't remember seeing anything like that before.
 
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wolfing said:
I'm guessing the mail will be displayed on screen as a picture, but you won't see the character wearing it
Click to expand...

Fargo's referred to the cheaper option as a 'paper doll'. Generally, with that sort of setup you put equipment icons over a generic display of a body (or just equipment windows vaguely arranged in the shape of a body). Think Grimrock or Realms of Arkanaia or Diablo.

The more expensive option is where the character is shown in detail as an avatar rather than as a vague body, and putting equipment on them changes the appearance of the avatar so that you can see the armour they're wearing change as you equip new items. Think World of Warcraft or Baldurs Gate or Titan Quest.
 
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Seems there was a strong core audience to get it to the goal, but you could say the kickstarter was a failure. Not sure anyone cares that much about their dream team people, they want more features in the game. Definitely did not appeal to a broad audience. Still will be interested to see it.
 
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Bard's Tale is simply super old and hardly anyone except the very tiny super hardcore Amiga gamers remembers it. I've been gaming since Atari/Nes and I had no clue what Bard's Tale was until this Kickstarter. Hence, there just isn't the audience for it like there is for Wasteland or Torment.

No biggie though. I trust inXile to make a great game even without 5 million...probably.
 
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I had the original Bards Tale for the C64. I was around 12 years old, so probably a little young for it, as it required WORK.

I just remember it being really hard and extremely easy to get lost.
 
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I wonder if InXile altered the standard Kickstarter funding curve by offering some free goodies for those who pledged in the first two days. This might have caused some front-loading of the funding, at the expense of a really big finish (some people just tend to procrastinate, unless given incentives not to).

The final number will probably end up being about the same as if they hadn't done it, but I guess this way they ensured their successful funding sooner. I'm actually not sure if that's a good thing, because once they hit their funding goal, there's not much incentive to push it higher (at least for me). InXile isn't some struggling indie outfit anymore; they've got two really good revenue streams getting ready to enter the pipe: WL2 for console, and Torment.

I'm confident they'll put in whatever resources are needed to make BT4 a great game...
 
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johnnysd said:
Seems there was a strong core audience to get it to the goal, but you could say the kickstarter was a failure. Not sure anyone cares that much about their dream team people, they want more features in the game. Definitely did not appeal to a broad audience. Still will be interested to see it.
Click to expand...

How was the kickstarter a failure....silly talk.
 
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Ovenall said:
I had the original Bards Tale for the C64. I was around 12 years old, so probably a little young for it, as it required WORK.

I just remember it being really hard and extremely easy to get lost.
Click to expand...

I was 21, so you're making me feel old :)
 
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I was thinking about this too, what to write as a worthy stretch goal? Finally I decided: if I - lets say - planned four villages originally as default content, I will announce two and the rest will be stretch goals. Its kinda hard to come up with stretch goals, when the danger of not finishing the game looms, because running out of money, energy, zeal. Running out of iron will and enthusiasm about the project sounds ridiculous, but very real from my own experience. So small games first - each taking two or three months to make - putting them on marketplace to see a minimal amount of income from sales to calm my subconscious fears:
1. I'm unable to create games that sell
2. My games aren't fun to play, people laughing and give low ratings, so obviously I'm a failure as a developer and all my gamedev dreams were pathetic delusional fantasies..
If I can refute 1. and 2. then it will help build self-confidence to start a real small RPG.

Also it doesn't hurt using previous assets so themes, world - fantasy - must be the same.

A downloadable demo at the beginning of the campaign is a must for unknown developers. Becoming somewhat known via earlier creations published on Kongregate and the like cannot hurt.
 
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Avantre said:
Fargo's referred to the cheaper option as a 'paper doll'. Generally, with that sort of setup you put equipment icons over a generic display of a body (or just equipment windows vaguely arranged in the shape of a body). Think Grimrock or Realms of Arkanaia or Diablo.

The more expensive option is where the character is shown in detail as an avatar rather than as a vague body, and putting equipment on them changes the appearance of the avatar so that you can see the armour they're wearing change as you equip new items. Think World of Warcraft or Baldurs Gate or Titan Quest.
Click to expand...

Yep, small icons put into slots beside a paper doll are cheapest and fastest to make. Fast to render in a 3D software as well - 256x256 pixel size for example - and heaping all kinds of 3D junk (literally) onto each other can accidentally result in a really good looking equipment. It may look absolute garbage, when viewed up close and rotated around in 3D, but in small size and from one angle it can look decent. I did a lot of those some 15 years ago and its like improvising on piano or fishing in a pond: you can catch anything! :)
 
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Also played it on the C64. Don't remember how old I was or much about the game, really, other than I enjoyed it. And it is plain silly to call the Kickstarter a failure, though I would agree adding a long string of stretch goals that do nothing but add staff to the development team was a bad idea. I'm sure it's very important to the quality of the game, but it just doesn't get people excited enough to open their wallets — new features, gimmicks and trinkets do.
 
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Fantasm said:
I wonder if InXile altered the standard Kickstarter funding curve by offering some free goodies for those who pledged in the first two days. This might have caused some front-loading of the funding, at the expense of a really big finish (some people just tend to procrastinate, unless given incentives not to).
Click to expand...

Yeah that is exactly what happened. InXile shot off all their marketing bullets in the first week or so to get off to a good start and didn't have anything else to throw in the pot later. And a lot of stuff is just getting the timing right - not so sure we'll see so many of those multi million dollar Kickstarters for PC games, although the people who played console games over the past few decades are still largely untapped.
 
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