Deathfire - Kickstarter Updates #20 & 21

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Deathfire: Ruins of Nethermore has a few more kickstarter updates in the last day again. You guys should know the drill by now details, and links are below.

Update #20 - "We passed 3,500 backers and offer a new Goal"

The Classless Character is here

Yesterday we managed to pass the 3,500 backer hurdle, which means that we will include a Classless Character Type to the game. As pointed out before, this character class will have the advantage of being a jack-of-all-trades, but he will also have some limitations. Surely, though, it will be a fun class to explore.

With this goal behind us, we have decided to set up a new goal, and I am sure you will like this—a lot! When we reach 4,500 backers, we will add the Nethermancer as a playable class to the game. However, the class will not be available to players straight away. Instead, it will be unlocked once you completed the game, giving you the opportunity to replay the game with this unique character class, which will, of course, offer a number of its own plot variations as you do so.
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Update #21- "Greenlit in 20 Days"

Greenlit in only 20 days!

As you might have heard by now, “Deathfire: Ruins of Nethermore” has been greenlit on Steam this morning. Amazingly, it took only 20 days to get there, and in the graphs we could see that the game was way ahead of the average curve, just plowing up the charts into the Top 100.

Being greenlit means that we now have a slot in the Steam catalog and we could sell the game on Steam any time we wanted to. Great news! There’s just one hitch… we don’t have a game yet, and as we are going into the final hours of this Kickstarter, hopefully the round of newly greenlit games will attract more players to give our campaign a look. We could certainly use a flock of new backers, couldn’t we? So let’s keep our collective fingers crossed and keep trying to get the message out.

Another video for you

Today I also have a new video clip for you. This is an early animation test of two dragons in front of the Apocryphic Temple. It is still rough around the edges and not properly timed, which is also the reason why it doesn’t have sound, but I wanted to let you guys see this clip before the Kickstarter ends, just to show you once more the scope of the game.
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More information.
 
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I backed them a few days ago, but the'll need one hell of a finish to make their goal - it's still only just above 40% with less than 60 hours to go. Being greenlit is a good sign though.
 
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Perhaps being greenlit helps Guido in finding publishers. I don't have any hope the KS campaign will succeed.
 
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They need to restart it in January when people will have the money to give.
 
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Oh well, I pledged even though I know there is no chance of them hitting the goal.
 
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guenthar said:
They need to restart it in January when people will have the money to give.
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I really doubt if this will help. Most likely the potential backers are waiting for all the other big KS campaigns to finally produce some games.
Perhaps March would be a better time when hopefully D:OS will have been released. Or better even in April after WL2 release.
 
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I understand this from a psychological point of view and I guess I feel a bit of it myself in that I am generally reluctant now to pledge more than the minimum or close to it even in projects that do look very promising and already have something to show for their efforts.
(i.e Stasis and Bloom. I did back Deathfire on the painterly and Lords of Xulima on the bronze medal editions though…)

I have to note that it does not make a lot of sense though.

Larian or Inxile or Obsidian releasing a Kickass game or not, should not really reflect on the platform as a whole, either positively or negatively, other than perhaps that it is possible to make a decent game on the amounts gathered on KS… And even then it still boils down to the skill sets and capabilities of the Dev teams/companies… Not to mention that very few projects even make that much money or have the same scope…

But still psychology may seem to play its part on backing trends (sort of like in the stock markets :) )
 
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Well, I think it makes some sense. It is still to be proven that crowdfunded projects (without a publisher doing some controlling) can produce great games.
 
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Ah yes, I've seen this particular sentiment voiced relatively often lately.
I prefer the artistic freedom that comes with the lack of a publisher (there are few decent ones out there apparently) even with the perils it brings.

Games can fail publisher or no publisher and their input seems to produce bug ridden half completed messes being released before being completed, more often than not…

I would prefer that Developer houses show the responsibility to invest in proper QA themselves without a whip wielding "evil publisher overlord" ;) And I will still not make broad statements that the model is incapable of producing decent games even if some fail as I prefer to judge people/Dev/Companies individually.
(Unless every single one of them fails to deliver that is ;) )
 
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mercy said:
Hire a pro particle FX artist. The dragon breaths need improvement.
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As it states in the corner of the video and in the text description also, this is a very early animation test, so yes, of course, it is incomplete and rough. The focus of the clip was to evaluate the animation of the dragons in an early stage - it still needs work, too. The breaths were really just afterthoughts to make the animation test presentable because we wanted to release this clip before the Kickstarter was over.
 
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txa1265 said:
Oh well, I pledged even though I know there is no chance of them hitting the goal.
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Thank you so much for doing that. You cannot imagine what this means to every one of us on the team to see people supporting is even at this stage.
 
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It's on my list to pledge, but payday is the last day of the kickstarter so it's going to be close.

I honestly think they'd be better off canceling gracefully at this point and using any money coming in from the Steam greenlight to shore up some of the glitzy stuff and have at it again in a month. Right now if they get funded it will be at just barely the goal. If they pull it and polish some showy bits and try again they could well hit the goal much sooner and start pushing some stretch goals. But if it's still up on Friday I will post a pledge.

I second the idea of timing it for just after release of a big name title like Divinity: Original Sin. Spend some time/money making the glitter glow, and hit it hard just as D:OS hits the market.

Good luck. Looks wonderful and I look forward to playing however it gets funded.
 
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I thought the dragons were epic. Besides -> fantasy + dragon + dungeon = ???

I'd have shown those dragons since the day 1. Who doesn't like dragons? And its something people can easily relate to :)

Arx Fatalis had dragons
Baldur's gate 2 had dragons
Gothic 2 had dragons
Dragon age orgins had dragons
Skyrim had dragons
Divinity dragon commander…ehm i think you'll get what i'm saying :p
 
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Dez said:
I thought the dragons were epic. Besides -> fantasy + dragon + dungeon = ???

I'd have shown those dragons since the day 1. Who doesn't like dragons? And its something people can easily relate to :)
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Thank you, Dez. I agree, the dragons are cool.

We downplayed the dragons this time because when we kickstarted Thorvalla, a number of comments went like "Since Skyrim, no one cares about dragons anymore…," hahaha! :)
 
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Well there is a thing about overusing them and them threatening to become the new zombies or Vampires.

Skyrim i.e. certainly did its very best of trivializing one of everybody's favorite beasts. They really should have handled it with a bit more finesse (a pity because they had the technology and presentation down pat. One of the first games to do dragons justice imo)

A dragon should be an epic and singular (or at least not commonplace) High level encounter tucked away on a craggy inaccessible mountaintop or in the deepest level of a dungeon (just make it plausible that he somehow squirmed down there ;) ).

I love how you actually had to go out of your way to find them in G3 for example and they had their own little Epic music piece of the encounter…

PS I quite like the Dragons in the little clip here, wip and all…

edit:
Guido Henkel said:
We downplayed the dragons this time because when we kickstarted Thorvalla, a number of comments went like "Since Skyrim, no one cares about dragons anymore…," hahaha! :)
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Exactly ;)

Still I would hate to see Developers second guessing the use of one of the most classic monsters there is. I am sure you'll treat them with the respect they deserve ;)
 
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JonNik said:
Well there is a thing about overusing them and them threatening to become the new zombies or Vampires.

A dragon should be an epic and singular (or at least not commonplace) High level encounter tucked away on a craggy inaccessible mountaintop or in the deepest level of a dungeon (just make it plausible that he somehow squirmed down there ;) ).
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Excactly. I think that's my biggest gripe with Skyrim, that you run around and just blow 'em out of the skies by the dozen. Much better handled in games like BG2 where they actually feel epic and are a challenge to overcome.
 
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Disappointed that this isn't going to get funded. Hopefully, they come back and try again, maybe asking for a lower dollar amount next time?
 
Too bad Kickstarter seemingly still doesn't support Paypal. With that I would have sent some money there.
 
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