Jagged Alliance: Flashback - Update #24, and 25

Full control released two updates today for Jagged Alliance: Flashback. The kickstarter is close to the end and still needs at least $70,000 with 47 hours left.

Again we want to thank you for all this support, for your trust and your help. Thank you so much, this already has been an amazing journey. We love you. Honestly.
So this is the first day we’re going for a second update. Why? Just because. And Javier already posted this on the Bear’s Pit. But we want you to know his thoughts as well, as he is one of our leading heads behind the scenes.

Assets and Modding

Hello everybody! People keep asking about budget things and how much money we can spend on this and that. So let me give you a small insight on the Art-Department. One of the challenges we face with whatever budget we have to make Jagged Alliance Flashback is of course what we make with the time and money we get. If you ever worked with 3D graphics you know its a time intensive affair. And sometimes not always a loved affair. To bring in the love again we need to have an art pipeline that is efficient and reduces wasted time. Cause wasted time is money thrown out of the window. And honestly: Who the hell does that?

New Tier Bundles

$2700 Two Please Tier: You sure drive a hard bargain, therefore you get: All previous rewards ($2500 not included) + The $1200 and $1800 bundled up (ONLY THIS TIER) Limited (3)
$3600 Lead and Conquer Tier: You’re quite the multitasker huh, you get: All previous rewards + The $1800 and the $2500 bundled up (ONLY THIS TIER) Limited (1)

Radio in JAF

Kaboom! As you may know, there’ll be an in-game radio in Jagged Alliance: Flashback. This means that here and there you’ll find radios to listen to and probably also be able to carry one with you for the road. Crank up the volume and go for it. To make this part a bit more interesting we’d like to add different music from the 1980’s era and include channels, each with their very own music style which people can choose from (in terms of modding we think we’re going the Grand Theft Auto way to allow people adding their own music, however that’s not yet clear).

While we won’t have Elliot, the idiot, in the game (which is for obvious reasons) you may have noticed that one of our backers already pledged to become the voice of the local radio. The radio host will occasionally be able to comment on the current situations happening in San Christobal. These are triggered either by the player succeeding or failing specific missions and can even be used to hint at troop movements across the island. Elliot might be gone and the faces change, but rest assured we’ll try hard to re-produce the same tongue-in-cheek situations and dialogue from JA2 in Flashback.

Diorama Commentary Video

We released a diorama commentary video to go along with the this morning's press release, so you should get a chance to see it in the update as well.

More information.

Never played Jagged Alliance so I'm on the fence, but I can't believe that this hasn't garnered more support so far from all the fans that I assumed were out there. I guess not having any actual gameplay footage is hurting it?

JA2 has a huge fanbase, so it kind of baffles me too. But I didn't pledge until last week either, I've pledged for so many games I've lost count, and I thought it would do fine without me. But seeing it struggling made me pledge anyway, I want the game to be made. JA2 is one of my all time favourite games.

I personally am a fan of the Jagged Alliance series and in fact the second game is one of my all time favorites but i won't be backing them. Reasons:

- BitComposer funded Jagged Alliance Back in Action which completely changed the combat system and was generally a mediocre game but they are not funding this one.If they don't believe in their own game and developer they licensed it to,then why should i ?

- Full Control is an unknown developer with no significant releases that can demonstrate their skills,so i cannot have confidence in them.

- With 350,000 $ they are asking and the small team that they have ,i doubt that we would see a quality and as complete a game as Jagged Alliance 2 was.

Originally Posted by Shryke
Never played Jagged Alliance so I'm on the fence, but I can't believe that this hasn't garnered more support so far from all the fans that I assumed were out there. I guess not having any actual gameplay footage is hurting it?

bitComposer almost single-handedly destroyed the franchise by making Jagged Alliance: Back in Action, which changed basically everything that made JA fun. Now people don't trust small companies like Full Control. Frankly, I don't blame them. It seems they want to keep the mechanics the same, but to do a prequel is really turning folks off— not to mention the "enemy" is Russia. Perhaps no one told them, but Russians were some of the game's biggest supporters if not THE biggest so making them the bad guys probably wasn't the best PR move.

They also weren't quite as prepared as they should have been for the KS marathon. Their initial information was sparse, their pledge tiers were "boring" and there weren't enough of them, and the concept art really isn't all that interesting. They've picked up the pieces since then, but they lost a huge chunk of money during the first few days.

Finally, they've repeatedly reported that no one is picking up their media releases. If the word isn't getting out, no one knows about it.

I don't think that making a prequel with the russian setting is turning that many people away. I tend to agree on what Japol wrote.

Their initial presentation and their pledge levels were bad. I guess lots of people check the project once, decide whether they want to pledge or not and then leave and never look back. In addition the initial spike has a snowball effekt which they wasted.

They neither have a big company name nor celebrity devs. Also they do not have any footage about the game. The diorama was released much too late. I don't know a single game project without a famous name and without gameplay footage which aimed for that much money.

The Updates were lacking content which really interests new people which aren't already on board or very close to the JA2 franchise. Also the way updates were handled was bad. You don't release a downloadable diorama and waste the potential to make a video out of it people can link and show on news sides and then release a video a few days later when it's already "old news". This kind of waste of potentian reflects the whole kickstarter campaign imho.

I am not sure if they can make a good game with 350k. I think a lot of potential was wasted by doing a bad campaign. Personally I don't know if it's better for the Jagged Alliance license if they have a shot at 350k (thats maybe 100-200k which they actually receive for the project) or if they don't make it and the license is potentially picked up later again.

They've had major increases in pledge levels these last 24hrs, so if we assume they'll have a final day spike like most other kickstarters I actually think (hope) they can make it. The reason i like their pitch is that they don't want to change that much from the original (or actually JA2), they just want to add more of the great stuff.

I actually enjoyed *some* of the things bitcomposer did, but I felt they totally screwed up lots of minor things. The combat system was actually pretty good, but to not include your own mercenary, missing fog of war, no proper militia training etc. made med tire of the game quickly. The strategic part is severely lacking in Back in action.

These guys want to go the other way, keep the tactical part as it was in JA2 but add further depth to the strategic layer. Sound absolutely great to me.

Yeah. I think the plans they have sound great. The question is whether or not they can put them into reality.

There was another update btw:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/…k/posts/488293

They finally added the cloth map as add on. Now I feel tempted to go for it.

I agree on the fact that they might not be able to pull the game off even if the kickstarter suceeds, that's a reason I didnät pledge to a higher tier. I've no problem with putting in 30$ to give them a fighting chance, I can live with the loss of my money if the game fails. If I was sure they'd suceed I'd gladly put in double for a new (proper!) Jagged Alliance game.

> $70,000 with 47 hours left

They're at $36,500 left with 27 hours to go, so at that rate they may just squeeze in under the wire at $359,000.

Originally Posted by tomasp3n
I agree on the fact that they might not be able to pull the game off even if the kickstarter suceeds, that's a reason I didnät pledge to a higher tier. I've no problem with putting in 30$ to give them a fighting chance, I can live with the loss of my money if the game fails. If I was sure they'd suceed I'd gladly put in double for a new (proper!) Jagged Alliance game.

They did indicate in an earlier update that they may be kicking in some of their own funds.

Originally Posted by Japol
- BitComposer funded Jagged Alliance Back in Action which completely changed the combat system and was generally a mediocre game but they are not funding this one.If they don't believe in their own game and developer they licensed it to,then why should i ?

As far as I know FC didn't want funding from BitComposer because they wanted to stay independent and do their own thing with JA Flashback without any outside interference.
So it is not the case that BitComposer didn't have faith in them.

6,717 Backers
$347,809 pledged of $350,000 goal
8 hours to go

Looks like they will make it.