KickStarter BattleTech Pre-Release Thread

It's probably a bit of both. It is already stated that the intent is for a trilogy, based on the success of the initial game's kickstarter. I'd say it's guaranteed at this point that there will be additional games set in different time periods.

http://www.usgamer.net/articles/battletech-kickstarter-7-things-you-should-about-the-game

It's more likely that the kickstarter will break 2.5 mill at this point than not. In order to hit the last stretch goal, they have to make more than ~38,062.00 per day. I really don't see it dipping less than that for many days, and if it does, the final push will make up for it.

 

Backer Mission Reward #1 - Livestream Q&A starts in 5 minutes.

http://www.twitch.tv/ngngtv/v/18783625

 

Will live update some Q&A if I think it's interesting enough. I'm paraphrasing, so listen for yourself if you want exact information.

Q>>Co-op mode?

Weisman >> Additional money raised over the 2.5 million will go towards funding and supporting a live development team to continue to develop updates to the game post launch. Based on interest, one of the first things they would potentially tackle would be a Co-Op mode. This would be done to avoid feature creep and pushing the launch date back.

Q>>Limits to battlemech customization for balance reasons?

Weisman >> Wants to avoid turning mechs into generic weapons platforms (re: don't expect completely open Table Top construction rules). They want all mechs and variants to have a role and parameters, but also want as much flexibility as possible while keeping individuality between mechs.

Q>>Friendly AI units / combined arms in skirmish mode?

A>>Possible, it's a goal.

Q>>Art direction, more cartoonish like Shadowrun or darker and more realistic?

A>>More realistic and gritty, but not hyper-realistic. Concept art thus shown is a good sample of the balance they are going for.

 

Q>>Considering the turn based play, will the turn be broken down into phases, movement, firing, etc?

A>>Prototyping combat now and looking at multiple ways to handle turn phases, nothing solid, all prelim.

Lost interest for a bit after the hosts refused to pass on questions about combat difficulty.

 

After asking 5-6 times about difficulty levels and the ability of HBS to make a challenging combat focused game, they finally got my question, after I dumbed it down considerably. I think the hosts refused to ask my initial, possibly more controversially worded questions.

Q>>Will the game have a multitude of increasing difficulty settings? Very hard mode was dropped from Shadowrun: Hong Kong and was a very easy, if excellent, game.

A>>They want the game to be challenging, whether that is with an adaptive AI or choosing your own diffculty, not sure. Want the game to correct to your skill level. They also want scenarios where you will lose battles and continue playing and not reload. It needs to illustrate the difficulty of being a mercenary outfit in the universe.

Jordan>>Mitch wants Iron Man with the expanded campaign goals.

Best listen to it to get the full info, I was a little shocked they were talking about it so I didn't get it down right away.

 

No problem--had to stop watching for a bit cause work, so I'm missing a lot.

Edit: but I'll probably go back later and post more things for the people that can't be assed to review it.

 

Voice Acting Bitches!!!!!!

 

Can't wait for the drunk livestream. I'll have to watch it drunk. Hopefully it's not during work hours, or I'll have some explaining to do.

 

Battletech earned $1,255,693 in its first 3 days.
Here's the picture I like to use to demonstrate the different spreads during a campaign:

We have multiple types of campaign here. We have front-loaded ones like Bard's Tale IV and Yooka-Laylee, campaigns with the more traditional Kickstarter behaviour like Mighty No.9*, and balanced ones like Project Eternity and Bloodstained.

Assuming a worst case scenario, it'd be similar to Bard's Tale IV. That means the $1,255,693 would be 66% of the total funding and in the end it'd reach $1,902,565.
More simulations:
60%: $2,092,821
55%: $2,283,078 (Close to Torment levels)
50%: $2,511,386 (Shenmue III)
45%: $2,790,428
40%: $3,139,232
35%: $3,587,694 (Project Eternity)

*Mighty No.9 technically had more funding in its first 3 days than in the chart above, mostly because it was launched in a Japan, so the timezone difference made the first 3 days more like 3.5.
It says 30% above, but in reality it was 36% at least.

The numbers above mean Battletech's first 3 days cannot be more than 50% of total funding, otherwise it won't reach its last stretch goal. However, it is very important to keep in mind that this is depends on the behaviour during the campaign. A smaller percentage in the first 3 days does not mean more money.
Case in point: Torment had 53% in its first 3 days and Eternity had 35%. Torment ended up making more money, but in the end it was pretty close ($4 million x $4.2 million).

This data is only useful if you have a type of campaign in mind, and it's worth keeping the actual money in mind as well.
Another very important aspect of this campaign is that it's the first big project of its genre to hit Kickstarter. This means the audience is different. The context and the expectations of fans can be compared to CRPG fans in some ways, but it's not the same thing.
Many important aspects are unique or very different, however:

• Unlike Eternity and TToN, which are brand new projects that pay homage to beloved ones, BattleTech is a 30yo franchise that appeals to the wargaming audience.
  
• The game will be turn-based. The only other big turn-based KS games are Wasteland 2 and TToN, but backers didn't know Torment was going to be turn-based, and some (myself included) even resent it for it.
• Awareness is a very important factor, and this KS was announced well in advance by HBS.

A lot of people have been comparing the campaign to TToN and Eternity regardless, so I went with a direct comparison to Torment because Eternity's campaign was very unusual and in a very different time for KS games. Torment was more front-loaded because it was after DFA, WL2 and shortly after Eternity, so the campaign was heavily exposed right off the bat.

This is the key here:

• This highlights a problem with the lack of tiers in the campaign. Torment had 27% of its funding in ranges that Battletech does not cover at all.
• BattleTech has a higher percentage of $125-275 backers, but Torment made $322k in the $350-750. It's a considerable amount of money.
  
• BT also has a higher % of $1000+ backers, but I'd say that's because it's early in the campaign and the big donors pledged earlier. The percentage will only go down, specially considering these rewards are limited in the first place.
• Torment had fewer $1-50 backers. If BT had the same ratio, it'd be at $1,356,401 rather than the $1,253,669 (without shipping) it had when I gathered the data. Now the opposite: if Torment had BT's ratio, it would've earned $3,649,813 instead of $3,949,042. That's an 8.1% increase by making the $1-50 backers upgrade their pledges, but they need more options in order to do that. It makes a big difference in the end.
• BattleTech average pledge per backer is currently $65. It was $74 in the first day. This reinforces the scenario that the big donors got wind of the campaign very early and pledged right away.
• $65 is still very high. Torment's average was $56, for example. HBS has to give backers more options in order to keep it that high, and having digital tiers in the $100+ range is a must, but I'll get there in a bit.

Thanks to user Lime for asking HBS about new tiers:

It's a valid concern, of course. How much time can they spend brainstorming new rewards and stuff instead of working on the game's pre-production? Does the extra funding compensate the man-hours spent on it? Honestly, I think it does, and I'm not suggesting I know more about schedules and game development than they do, it's just that the things they could add don't require a lot of brainstorming at all.

The lack of tiers is not the only problem, by the way. Both the $125 and $275 (and all of the $1000+ as well) include only physical goods as extra rewards. This means that if you want to upgrade your $50 pledge, you have to more than double your money up to $125 plus shipping. It's even worse if you're an international customer, in which case the taxes and international shipping could make it extremely expensive, and for a lot of people, simply not worth it.

For instance: HBS are well known for the Shadowrun series already. Why not include a "HBS tier" where you get copies of the Shadowrun games? It's not the same genre or IP, but they're pretty good games, and it's inherently optional anyway.
Maybe a cross-promotion reward as well? Eternity and Torment had tiers with copies of WL2, for example.
BattleTech has the original tabletop games and more than a hundred books out there. I don't know what's the relationship/deal with Catalyst, but that's something that would benefit both. Books as digital rewards and lots of physical rewards to add as well.
Golem Arcana is another game by HBS that could be add as both physical and digital rewards/add-ons.
Also, at least one digital tier with more copies of the game is very easy to add and a no-brainer, if you ask me.

In regard to stretch goals, can't say much because they haven't been revealed yet, but I think the lack of mod tools is a mistake. It did wonders to Shadowrun games and it's a great addition to any game. It adds longevity, word of mouth, and allows fans to keep creating new content for the game. It's even more important here IMO, assuming it reaches the PVP MP goal.

 

This is good. Most people don't seem to realize that canonically modifying a BattleMech or an OmniMech is SUPER HARD and expensive, and has limitations due to targeting computers and such.

The tabletop customization rules aren't really that. They're 'Mech creation rules, and generally I'd say the tabletop game is better off running with just official 'Mechs due to how much cheese you can pack with customs.

 

So I was thinking that I didn’t really need to do actual work or anything useful this afternoon, which led to a….

Half-assed Transcript of First Backer Q&A Livestream Part 1 of just watch the rest if you really care

<insert Funkytown Sc-Fi Ambient Tunes>

Mike McCain: Welcome to the new set…

NGNG: Ladies and gentlemen, mechwarriors of all ages, mech fans around the world and the Inner Sphere—

Who the shit cares, let’s get to the meat.

<fast forward>

Mitch: —give a big shout out to Alex—

Nope…

<fast forward>

Jordan: —regular updates keeping people abreast throughout the development of—

Nope, nope.

<fast forward>

NGNG: —ready to start taking some live questions—

Jordan: Yes absolutely!

Aha…here we are, finally, at 30 minutes in….

NGNG Q#1: Any plans to have weapons from individual manufacturers in the game, question from uh, Zeromind?

Fuck don’t you people read articles this has already been discussed…zeromind…lol…

Mike: Oh yeah…

Jordan: That’s our hope, yeah. One of the things that we want to do, especially in the expanded campaign, uh, this is more in the context of the expanded campaign than in the more narrow story, linear, campaign, but in the expanded campaign we really want to try to bring out the concept of the economy of the Inner Sphere and that includes how you negotiate contracts with the different houses, and their, uh, priorities and their agendas and also where things are manufactured. Now, the cutoff layer of detail that we don’t know how far, how deep we can go before it becomes overwhelming and too hard to balance, but our goal is to be able to reflect that some things are easier to get in different parts of the Inner Sphere than others, and that there’s a cost, uh cost modifiers associated with that.

Mike: Yeah, I got a question in the comments, that, “are you going to have a realistic economy?” Like, no! The economy is…not…fun, look around. We’ll have a ‘fun’ economy.

Mitch: We’ll see what the Comstar Fed does…

Nice one Mitch…I’m sure they’d keep interest rates low during the time of uncertainty brought about by the uneasy truces between the great houses and unstable job growth on many key planets, while simultaneously trying to increase private sector mercenary spending through quantitative easing…

NGNG Q#2: Option of buying all or some of the Kickstarter patches, I want , also banners, people were asking about [more options for physical rewards as add-ons not in the reward tiers]?

<chorus of yeahs>

Jordan: This is something we’ve been debating a bunch because physical goods are something we all love, because, well, I, <looks around office covered in mechwarrior/btech shit> After waiting the original kickstarted video we had the video from Randall with all the cool things, I had to build this set. This is not a real office, we all sit in a bit room, I have a desk, but I built this, because I was like I have cool stuff and I want to show it too! This is kinda a gemmed up thing we all put together.

Mitch: Your move Randall.

Jordan: Update it Randall! So, we love physical rewards, but also we have to watch out for this evil thing called MOQ, minimum order quantities, and shipping, and the fact that we’re primarily a software company and not a physical goods company, but that said we have heard that, and we are coming up with responses to try to help meet that goal in some way.

Mike: The main thing that you need to understand, is, two things, one is what Jordan said, that we’re game developers, not, you know, shop clerks—

Jordan: But it’s something that we’d love to be able to help—

Mike: We want—

Mitch: We’d love it…

Yes, yes you would Mitch…

Mike: but the other thing is…

Mitch: We’ll have answers next week on this topic is really what it boils down to. We’re looking into it.

Mike: We are, but like, what we’re going to tell people, is we have rights to offer these physical rewards as ‘rewards’ as thank you’s, not the right to sell them to you. We’re looking into it. We want you to be able to have this stuff, it’s just that we can’t right now.

Jordan: Yup. That’s a fair statement.

Mitch: The concept of an Add-on is equivalent to selling as opposed to a reward.

Jordan: As opposed to a thank you in the reward tier…but we’re working on that one.

NGNG Q#3: This is another question that keeps coming up and coming up, so if you guys want to address this…this is from Roadbeer…

Smokes and road beers, be quick…

…what are the chances of adding co-op? Everybody wants co-op…if we get you 3 million, 4 million?

Jordan: <laughs> Uhm…so, yeah we would love co-op as well. And we, uh…within the scope of the first game, the one we want to build and ship, it’s outside of the scope of that. But…if indeed we are successful and move past the 2.5 million goal for multiplayer, what that additional money will go to is the funding of an ongoing live team. That live team will then allow us to continue to develop features and content beyond the initial release. One of the first features we would address would be co-op play. We think that there is a natural way to fit it within the context of the skirmish game. So, it’s outside the scope of what we will ship with the first title, but if indeed funding exceeds the 2.5 that will go to a live team and the live team’s highest priority would be working on co-op.

Mitch: To be clear, to set expectations on that, we’re talking about co-op in the skirmish mode, playing with a friend against AI on a specific map or a specific encounter, not co-op campaign, which is a much bigger undertaking—

Jordan: Much bigger.

Mitch: —that would be out of scope.

Jordan: Co-op within the context of the skirmish where you would be able to design opponents and situations and battle with them with your friends.

Gotta say, the live team concept for additional funding past set goals is a great idea to deal with feature creep. Not that they haven't been doing a variation on that all along, really, to meet their release deadlines.

End Part 1, or am I just done. I mean christ….that was three questions. I have feels~ for transcriptionists now.

 

Yeh, I get that, it was mainly for my own amusement before I realized how shitty transcriptionists have it.

 

:bribery:

 

http://www.usgamer.net/articles/battletech-kickstarter-7-things-you-should-about-the-game

Oh man, this article has all the right words/phrases and now I am pumped!
Or is just because I read the article listening to Pantera - Walk?

The 3D mechwarrior portraits would be hard to achieve at a standatd where it would not look cheesy and cartoonish.
The interlaced video captured mugshots of the pilots in Mechcommander would be more fitting and also cheap.

 

Who is that?

 

Adam Jensen

 

I had to google him.

Also technically speaking, he is asking for this.

 

I never asked for this.

 

No no he is going to ask for this.