Antharion - Falls Short

Originally Posted by DArtagnan
Agreed. I, for one, will never figure out when "cutie cutie cartoonish" became the accepted norm in the indie segment. I feel like I'm from a different planet when I hear so many RPG fans throw praise on that visual approach.

Then again, I feel that very same way when people praise JRPGs.

Dude, trust me, you are on different planet then the rest of us.

Yeah, I'd invite you to visit planet Reality sometime, but I'm not sure you could handle it

Originally Posted by zahratustra
Are mere promises of "an immense open-ended living-breathing world where the player is free to go anywhere and do anything" and "deep tactical turn-based combat system" enough to get you going?

Actually, just the second part is all I need.

Originally Posted by DArtagnan
Yeah, I'd invite you to visit planet Reality sometime, but I'm not sure you could handle it

Sadly, that reality you speak of is the reality where publishers ruled the gaming world. Crowdfunding worked for the first few but is quickly becoming a marketing and preorder platform for people capable of investing into techs like Star Citizen's BEFOREHAND.

Oh well, fun while it lasted and all that.

Preorder platform. Good point. This means established studios with a fanbase could use it to bypass publishers. Others … well …

Originally Posted by Gorath
Preorder platform. Good point. This means established studios with a fanbase could use it to bypass publishers. Others … well …

Tht isn't my impression at all. Successful projects are increasingly projects that could afford to go a long ways before reaching Kickstarter. The few exceptions date back to the beginning of the crowdfunding era, when criticizing publishers was the way to go. Thorvalla is kind of showing that having just an idea and a fanbase doesn't cut it anymore. Hopefully the coming days will prove me wrong.

I'm not really sure the Thorvalla guys have a huge fanbase compatible with Kickstarter.

Credit Cards are quite uncommon in Germany.
Would be interesting to know how many people pledged on their own homepage via paypal yet.
Maybe a not so clever move to add this option right at the beginning.

I don't think anyone in the industry has a huge enough fanbase. But even if they did, the press not talking about it will ensure that most of the fanbase they have won't even know they kickstarted anything in the first place.

So it seems that people with ideas, possibly a reputation and no money are shut out and those that can budget good cinematics are in. It's looking a whole lot like a year ago.

Now now, let's not write off Kickstarters just yet. Lots of games are getting funded that might not have worked out well without this model. Just because a few recent titles don't make it - doesn't mean it's not working. Especially considering the kind of titles that fail. It's easy to promise the world - but you have to be convincing about it - and you have to appeal to enough people.

I think the Kickstarter model has the potential to be something absolutely fantastic for the future of game design. In fact, I predict the chance of it succeeding as a real alternative is more than 50% - and THAT chance is better than anything in the reality of the publisher world.

Kick-starters will have to sustain their image within the games industry for the foreseeable future in order to gain a normalised stature, more projects failing will not help to maintain that image, pledging to shaky ventures does not help the kick-start concept. The band-waggon effect is noticeable, some projects appear questionable and less than economical with the proposed product information. The more risky ventures could be choking the potential of the kick-starter concept overall - there appears to be no segregation filter element that can be applied to kick-starter project choice, it will remain forever notional - a gamer choice.

Caveat emptor (let the buyer beware!)

You underestimate the effect of a few massively successful games.

If something like Project Eternity or Star Citizen actually succeeds in transcending the publisher problems - and manage to truly evolve the genres, then people will flock to support similar stuff.

As for small projects - that could be another matter, but then again - they don't need many supporters. Again, if some small projects succeed in giving players what they want - it doesn't matter that some of them fail. The smaller the project, the fewer people are required.

However, as with all things - it has to be a real alternative, and we WILL need to see results in the majority of cases. That goes without saying.

But I'm pretty sure the core market is ripe for going against the publisher model - and MILLIONS of core fans are anxious to get back to an evolution of design, or at least back to the peak of genres.

Well said, D'Artagnan. And there also is the simple fact that supporting a game on KS is far more exiting, even *fun* than buying another game from the bargain bin or its digital equivalent, the steam sale. Failure is and will remain part of the crowdfunding approach, but so will success.

Anyone know if they will relaunch as planned tomorrow?

Yep they've relaunched
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/…ld-school-rpg/

Sweet. I backed my first Kickstarter.

Originally Posted by UDM
Yep they've relaunched
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/…ld-school-rpg/

Smaller heads!
They´ll reach the goal (and exceed the original one) easily this time.

We need a news item for this….. YO

Wow I just noticed their ask is only 10K this time. They are almost at 2K already so that should be a breeze. I want this to hit the 25K range though. Spell effects and polish. Wouldn't it be great to see some gib art like Baldur's Gate? I always loved that. They have blood effects already but I want the screen to shake with big AOE spells and see those cute little avatars go boom!

Originally Posted by ToddMcF2002
Wouldn't it be great to see some gib art like Baldur's Gate? I always loved that. They have blood effects already but I want the screen to shake with big AOE spells and see those cute little avatars go boom!

Ha yeah! Can we get some fallout style OTT critical hit death animations as well!