Creator of Wasteland 2 #BrianFargo doesn’t believe that people are sick of #funding projects on Kickstarter, only that not all project are meant to be funded.
Wasteland 2 launched its Kickstarter in 2012 hoping to raise $900,000, and eventually hit nearly $3 million in funding. Many other Kickstarters didn’t have as much luck. Renegade Kid’s Cult County, for example, failed to meet its funding goal earlier this month.
“I think sometimes some of the projects that have failed is Kickstarter doing its job,” Fargo told Digital Spy. “Which is saying, ‘We don’t really want that, or there’s already too much like it’. I think it worked very well for us, and it worked well for [Tim] Schafer, because it’s quite honest to say this game wouldn’t have existed without it, period, because we’re a middle-ground developer, we’re not two guys.”
Harmonix’s Amplitude, which was successfully Kickstarted last week, fits Fargo’s description, as does Keiji Inafune Mighty No. 9, which raised more than $3.8 million on Kickstarter. Both of them appeal to niches in the market that weren’t being served otherwise, but there’s less demand for such games with each successfully funded Kickstarter.
Quite honestly, this all fits well within the confines of games that suit a niche, but all of the games outlined here also have a history. In other words, they build up a following long before Kickstarter or crowdfunding was a “a thing”. So we really do have to give credit to all those indie titles coming on stream. It’s not just tripe-A game companies that are making in-roads, it’s those who are original and innovative. That is where the niche market exists.
As for the big money, bringing in millions through crowdfunding, that all depends on presentation, media presence, and of course being available online. Simple things, like a game webpage, Twitter, Facebook page, and the same for a developers own social media. Then making sure people understand the depth of what is being developed, which is huge.
At Linux Game News we see a plethora of new Kickstarters all the time. In fact we have been invited to report on more campaigns than we have in just introducing people to new or upcoming games. Why? It’s simple, gamers want to see something new and original.
As a further Brian Fargo example: “There was a Fallout audience that loved one and two, and they wanted something more like that than where Fallout 3 and New Vegas went,” he said. “Now if somebody came up with another one after us, it wouldn’t do as well, I think, because we would have been scratching that itch.”
Wasteland 2 will release around “the end of August” 2014, on PC, Mac, and Linux.
