Vault Dweller vs. Infinitron on Kickstarter, Spikes and Stretch Goals (also dongs)

[Infinitron]

I hoped that Torment 2 will hit 100,000 people, but I think they fucked up with their "Another [NAME] joins the team! The game gets better!" which is the dumbest fucking approach.

From what I recall, according to you, the way to succeed on Kickstarter is to post lots and lots of pretty screenshots. You once told me that Obsidian should have spent their entire pitch making images like that of the beautiful prerendered waterfall scene. You said they could have reached five million or more if they had done that.

But...no Kickstarter project has more "screenshots" than Divinity: Original Sin. They already have a functioning game!

 

[felipepepe]

VD is right, is a dog-eat-dog world out there... Fargo never showed games at kickstater, he sold dreams, of whatever sort the audience wanted.

Just look at Torment 2... fastest & largest game to be funded on KS and we don't even know it's combat system or if has 2D or 3D backgrounds... all we "know" is that it will be awesome, a spiritual sucessor to Torment, have a bunch of famous writers, INCLINE!, Old-school, and whatever... they have fucking 3.1M, while Larian is having a hard time reaching 400k with an almost finished game.

(I do not say this bashing Fargo & Co. I blame the game, not the player, Fargo is just a munchkin.)

 

[hiver]

Yeah, also look at attempts to sell new IPs without info.

Guido Henkel, Chris Taylor? ring a bell?

I didnt think so.

 

[Vault Dweller]

From what I recall, according to you, the way to succeed on Kickstarter is to post lots and lots of pretty screenshots.

Never claimed that.

You once told me that Obsidian should have spent their entire pitch making images like that of the beautiful prerendered waterfall scene. You said they could have reached five million or more if they had done that.

Well, not by images alone, but yes, I do believe they could have hit 5 mil if they showed more visuals. They were selling a BG-like game, a trip back to the IE games with beautiful backgrounds. Showing such backgrounds was a must and the reaction to the one they posted was overwhelming (whereas the official reaction to "the concept art of a human fighter holding a sword" was 'meh'). Simply showing boring screenshots (like the first WL2 images) won't do much though.

But...no Kickstarter project has more "screenshots" than Divinity: Original Sin. They already have a functioning game!

See above. Besides, since we're all friends here and shit, these screens are poorly chosen. They look like Diablo 3 or Torchlight 2. You have to know about the game to look beyond them.

 

[Infinitron]

Well, not by images alone, but yes, I do believe they could have hit 5 mil if they showed more visuals. They were selling a BG-like game, a trip back to the IE games with beautiful backgrounds. Showing such backgrounds was a must and the reaction to the one they posted was overwhelming (whereas the official reaction to "the concept art of a human fighter holding a sword" was 'meh'). Simply showing boring screenshots (like the first WL2 images) won't do much though.

Okay, what about Torment? What should they have done instead of announcing writers? How do you "sell the dream" for a game like Torment beyond what was already in the initial pitch?

Personally, I think there's actually relatively little you can do for a Kickstarter that has already achieved critical mass. It will grow to a certain size and there's not much you can do to grow it beyond that. It lives and dies by its brand name, and "Torment" is a bigger name than "Divinity".

 

[Jaesun]

derail codex.

 

[Zeriel]

Okay, what about Torment? What should they have done instead of announcing writers? How do you "sell the dream" for a game like Torment beyond what was already in the initial pitch?

Personally, I think there's actually relatively little you can do for a Kickstarter that has already achieved critical mass. It will grow to a certain size and there's not much you can do to grow it beyond that. It lives and dies by its brand name, and "Torment" is a bigger name than "Divinity".

New Mark Morgan music track + 2D background every week. SEARCH YOUR HEART. You know this to be true. Instant 8 million.

 

[Infinitron]

New Mark Morgan music track + 2D background every week. SEARCH YOUR HEART. You know this to be true. Instant 8 million.

8 million from who? You're assuming there's some huge audience of people who are watching this Kickstarter daily, but aren't convinced to pledge. I'm not sure that's true. I think there are some natural limits here, that there's simply a limited number of potential backers for oldschool RPG Kickstarters in the world. At least until some of these Kickstarter games are actually released and sold on Steam.

Besides, who's gonna make those 2D backgrounds? inXile is a small company. Not even Obsidian could make one of those every week, despite what Vault Dweller thinks.

 

[Zeriel]

A single unemployed artist can mock up a really good looking background. Thing doesn't have to be gameplay _functional_, mind, or even renderable in an engine.

A reminder of what a single guy can do:

You may be right on the upper limit of what the Kickstarter can do. I think an ideal, perfect Kickstarter _might_ be able to push up to the 60-70K backer range for this type of game. On the one hand, that's getting close to what these sorts of games used to make at retail, which is absurd to expect people to back/pre-order in that amount. On the other hand... Torment has grown massively as a brand since it came out, we've had me-too bandwagon gaming journalists talking about how awesome it is for the last decade, so I could see more money being pushed into this. Baldur's Gate 2 sold hundreds of thousands of units, and in the absence of any actual games in that genre for years and years, I think people are underestimating the demand for specifics that really confirm that these games are living up to the legacy they say they are. How many people are on the fence about Torment because they suspect it's going to be 3D shovelware?

"We're not going to show much of anything, because if people see specifics they might not back" is definitely a valid strategy for Kickstarting, it's what Fargo went with, and it strikes me as a safe and conservative way to run things. Could they sell more if they risked bombing on specifics and really made it look good? I think so.

On a bit of a sidenote, I do find myself wondering about the financial downsides of Kickstarting into tiers that are basically preorders. Thousands of people buying your game at 20$ has to hurt in the long run, when they could eventually be paying 60$.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Besides, who's gonna make those 2D backgrounds? inXile is a small company. Not even Obsidian could make one of those every week, despite what Vault Dweller thinks.

Oh please. There is a fucking army of quality contract artists who will be happy to draw you anything you want if you pay them good money. $1,000-2,000 a piece will buy you a fucking marvel.

Edit:

8 million from who? You're assuming there's some huge audience of people who are watching this Kickstarter daily, but aren't convinced to pledge. I'm not sure that's true.

Well, the mere fact that PE got 17,000 more backers suggests that there are 17,000 people who are watching this KS (wait, which KS are we're talking about it?) but weren't convinced yet. Similarly, just because PE managed to get 74,000 backers doesn't mean that there weren't more people out there, who could have pledged but decided not to.

If KS for RPGs has limits, I can assure you that we haven't seen them yet.

 

[Infinitron]

Besides, who's gonna make those 2D backgrounds? inXile is a small company. Not even Obsidian could make one of those every week, despite what Vault Dweller thinks.

Oh please. There is a fucking army of quality contract artists who will be happy to draw you anything you want if you pay them good money. $1,000-2,000 a piece will buy you a fucking marvel.

Dude, you're giving Brother None a heart attack with these statements.

 

[JarlFrank]

Only P:E had a trully massive spike. To reach five millions Torment would require one milion in the last day. Too big i think.
As for P:E, while an original IP, it's still a spiritual successor to Planescape:Torment, Baldur's Gate 1+2 and Icewind Dale 1+2.
It had a brand name behind it.

Well, Thorvalla was also supposed to be a spiritual sucessor to the Realms of Arkania games, and that didn't work out so well.

 

[Infinitron]

If KS for RPGs has limits, I can assure you that we haven't seen them yet.

Yes, but I trust you are familiar with the concept of diminishing returns?

We need some of these games to actually be released to increase trust in the Kickstarter process. People who buy Wasteland 2 or Project Eternity on Steam and like them may be willing to back the next big thing on Kickstarter.

 

[FeelTheRads]

Dude, you're giving Brother None a heart attack with these statements.

It's true, though. If you really just go for mock-ups (that is nothing that's really usable at that moment) it really wouldn't be expensive. Why won't they do it? Dunno... maybe they don't want to show something that they can't later achieve in the game.

 

[Vault Dweller]

If KS for RPGs has limits, I can assure you that we haven't seen them yet.

Yes, but I trust you are familiar with the concept of diminishing returns?

We need some of these games to actually be released to increase trust in the Kickstarter process. People who buy Wasteland 2 or Project Eternity on Steam and like them may be willing to back the next big thing on Kickstarter.

Trust has nothing to do with it. People are more than happy to throw money at these things if they are sufficiently entertained and feel that they are buying something AWSUM!

PE came out of nowhere, was vague as fuck, had almost no details, and it hit 1 mil in a day. What trust, bro?

 

[Infinitron]

Trust has nothing to do with it. People are more than happy to throw money at these things if they are sufficiently entertained and feel that they are buying something AWSUM!

PE came out of nowhere, was vague as fuck, had almost no details, and it hit 1 mil in a day. What trust, bro?

Yes, but what about all the people who didn't pledge? You're the one who's telling me they're out there.

There are people out there who aren't buying into dreams and promises. What they need to see is that the Kickstarter process, which is new and untested, can actually produce a good game.

You're assuming that because trust wasn't required for the people that you saw, then it also doesn't matter for the people who you didn't see. Selection bias.

 

[Zeriel]

Trust has nothing to do with it. People are more than happy to throw money at these things if they are sufficiently entertained and feel that they are buying something AWSUM!

PE came out of nowhere, was vague as fuck, had almost no details, and it hit 1 mil in a day. What trust, bro?

Yes, but what about all the people who didn't pledge? You're the one who's telling me they're out there.

There are people out there who aren't buying into dreams and promises. What they need to see is that the Kickstarter process, which is new and untested, can actually produce a good game.

You're assuming that because trust wasn't required for the people that you saw, that it doesn't matter for the people who you didn't see. Selection bias.

My take on that is a little different. I don't need to know that the process works. I need to know that the game I am backing doesn't suck. If I go into Safeway (local grocery store), I don't automatically assume every product in the store is excellent. I really do think some of these Kickstarters are leaving money on the table with their avoidance of specifics... or hell, taking a page out of VD's books, not even specifics, avoidance of showing something really cool that may not even end up in the game. (Queue INJUSTICE OF BROKEN PROMISES!!!1)

Admittedly, just saying "It'll be everything you love!" is a great way to get lots of money without comitting any extra effort into your campaign. Makes you wonder what the ratio is of people who would cancel pledges if they didn't like the specifics is to people who would pledge if they saw something more concrete.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Yes, but what about all the people who didn't pledge? You're the one who's telling me they're out there.

There are people out there who aren't buying into dreams and promises. What they need to see is that the Kickstarter process, which is new and untested, can actually produce a good game.

You're assuming that because trust wasn't required for the people that you saw, then it also doesn't matter for the people who you didn't see. Selection bias.

There are *all* kinds of people out there. People who didn't pledge because they pirate games, people who didn't pledge because they don't trust KS, people who didn't pledge because the campaign didn't do enough to push them to pledge, etc.

You are assuming that KS reached its limits. I'm looking at the trend. WL2 was a huge, extremely successful KS beloved by the media. Yet PE easily outdid it by pressing the right buttons and gaining 17,000 extra customers. What makes you think that Torment 2 couldn't have gotten these people and then some?

Regardless of what you think of my posts on the matter, I hope you agree that the goals are bad and very uninspiring. Deeper story and reactivity. What the fuck does it mean? How deep did we get now that we tripped the goal?

You have to offer potential customers tangible shit. Compare:

 

[Infinitron]

Regardless of what you think of my posts on the matter, I hope you agree that the goals are bad and very uninspiring. Deeper story and reactivity. What the fuck does it mean? How deep did we get now that we tripped the goal?

What does it mean? Something that a PS:T fan should care about, I would say. Walls of text!

You didn't tell me what your suggestion was for what the stretch goals should be.

You are assuming that KS reached its limits. I'm looking at the trend. WL2 was a huge, extremely successful KS beloved by the media. Yet PE easily outdid it by pressing the right buttons and gaining 17,000 extra customers. What makes you think that Torment 2 couldn't have gotten these people and then some?

Like I said, diminishing returns. It might get more people, but not much more. W2 was the first of its kind so of course they could improve over that.

 

[Zeriel]

Yeah, I feel like they should have replaced the stretch goals of writers with "<Insert X Level/Map/Area>". They implied/communicated once or twice in the wall of text updates that every new writer means new parts of the game implemented by artists and so forth to go along with that writing/"reactivity", but it just isn't clearly communicated enough in the images and front page summary. P:E's way of doing things came off as a little exploitive and psychopathic, but hey, it works.

 

[hiver]

No they should have explained what "writers" actually do in game design. So our infinotron would understand, at the very least.

And then sauced that with practical details and examples of areas, quests, maybe some freaking idea on magic system, or combat or something.

With art added....


...



hey... is this ... Where did Original Sin thread go?

 

[Jaesun]

Yeah.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Regardless of what you think of my posts on the matter, I hope you agree that the goals are bad and very uninspiring. Deeper story and reactivity. What the fuck does it mean? How deep did we get now that we tripped the goal?

What does it mean? Something that a PS:T fan should care about, I would say. Walls of text!

They need 2 extra mil to make the story deeper?

You didn't tell me what your suggestion was for what the stretch goals should be.

Something that many people would want and care about. "More better" is generic as fuck and tells people nothing. Things like the player's house, stronghold, crafting and enchanting, adventurer's hall, paladins and chanters (after Obsidian explained in details what a chanter is people were dying to get one in their party), difficulty modes, etc are very specific things that invoke very specific images. "Deeper" is a buzz word.

Even the dungeon - you look at it and see it taking shape, see the levels, see the progression, can practically see your character exploring it. The Torment's thing doesn't come close. It's cool and it might end up being better than the dungeon, but visually it's presented very poorly.

Like I said, diminishing returns. It might get more people, but not much more. W2 was the first of its kind so of course they could improve over that.

You say it like it's a fact. What makes you think that a good KS can only hit 75,000 backers but not a 100,000 or 125,000. Are these outrageous numbers? Is it that hard to agree that the stretch goals aren't exciting and they simply don't drive enough people? That PE's stretch goals offered a lot more, offer things that people wanted, understood, and were excited about it?

 

[tuluse]

They need 2 extra mil to make the story deeper?

Depends on your definition of deeper. I think by deeper they mean more reactive, fleshed out, and longer. I think you do need more money to do those things.

 

[felipepepe]

Yeah, saying "we add Pat Rohfuss to the team" is cool for fans and all, but how many of the pledgers even know who the fuck this guy is? Even those who know, wound't they prefer something like an extra PC class than an extra guy doing the writting? MCA comes with batteries an extra NPC, but Pat is just "more text"... is hard to "feel" and get excited for something like this.

If Larian made the changes more visible and exciting, like "choose your PC's race", "have full script control on the editor", "+20 new quests", "we'll send a 'fuck your KS' letter to LB" and the likes, they would defintly gain more attention... perhaps is something for the stretch goals, and they are waiting to be sure that the campaign will succeed before getting too excited...