Game News Bloom - "Action adventure with a dose of RPG" on Kickstarter

[Mastermind]

So far things are going great

 

[mondblut]

Fuck it, is now anything "with a dose of RPG" a topic on the Codex? I want my Call of Duty news, they have "a dose of RPG" too.

 

[Metro]

We aren't trying to sell you the game for 30 dollars. It will probably be way cheaper when / if it comes out.

If you put that in big bold letters on your Kickstarter page you probably wouldn't make another thousand dollars tops (hell you probably won't make that, anyway, at the rate you're going).

The 30 dollars is about supporting the project because you want to see something new that you won't see out of a larger company.

That justification might fly if Studio Fawn were one of maybe half a dozen indie development houses out there. It isn't. There are literally hundreds upon hundreds of indie developers putting out similar quality or better games (and not the size of Obsidian or with grants like Fez). Welcome to the RPG Codex. Browsing these forums for more than thirty minutes would inform you that 99% of the posters here loathe the AAA industry with a passion and understand the funding issues faced by independent developers

To the point: the vast majority of Kickstarter projects offer their game at a discount for 'preordering/having the faith to pony up your money before actually seeing a completed project.' That's just smart business. To think that anywhere near enough people will front extra money just for the feel good notion of supporting your studio is fairly naive. It's not as if your one studio will make or break this recent indie game crowd funding revolution. There's nothing wrong with having higher tiers with extra fluff/feel good stuff but to flat out state you will charge less for the game than the actual tier you need to buy into to secure a copy before the game has even finished development is crazy.

 

[curry]

good luck trying to get funding for a noname project without showing any actual ingame footage

 

[Burning Bridges]

"Bloom"



If this was an AAA game rpgcodex would ridicule that name now. But since it's a well intentioned Indie, we stand above such things

Graphics look quite good actually, regardless of the naming. Though it's more of an adventure game, right?

 

[Studio Fawn]

We definitely plan to do special things for those that back us in these early stages. We really aren't like other companies that intends to take your money and then forget who you are the next day. Those who support us now will never be forgotten or ignored (there is no other company who would make that promise, even those whom the community makes millions... they send you your swag and wash their hands of you). If you are really more concerned over saving 10 dollars than any of that, than what we are offering isn't what you are looking for.

We offer a unique relationship, something that goes beyond a discount on a single early release of a game. If the game works out, and the company survives, you will continue to see lots of special things just for those who were with us at the beginning now (and that is something you will find no other company saying).


We would love to have in-game footage...we would love to have the game to sell you right now But, well, we simply don't. And that is why we are coming to the community asking for help. We aren't trying to sell you something and run, we are asking for you to join us and lend us a hand with a few bucks. And for that, we are offering to work at living costs and will give our talents and immense amount of time to the project (beyond just a 9-5).

The stage we are at is the end of pre-production. We have the concepts, the story, the world fleshed out, the technology researched and ready to be thrown in, even a bunch of production models. That is what we are offering. If that isn't enough, that is totally understandable.

For those that see something special in what we do have to show and decide to support us, we won't forget you (no matter what happens with this campaign).

That is really the best we can say.

 

[turbo elephant]

1) Archery - The primary tool your character has is a bow and arrow. This is a rather weak attack in itself, but more so functions as the main tool with which you can interact with the world. You are also able to attach both enchantments and / or items onto your arrows in order to deliver​

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[procrastinator]

What an inspiring speech.

 

[Burning Bridges]

Nothing wrong with him presenting his ideas. Though it all sounds very naive. But not yet on subbassman's level. Funding goals seem unrealistic, but we'll see.

 

[Metro]

Don't get me wrong -- I don't want this game to fail but you have to deal with the reality of the Kickstarter landscape. Dedication and sincere good will is only going to take you so far.

 

[Studio Fawn]

I've learnt dedication will get you wherever you want to go Everyone I know has gotten where they are through some major dedication.

The sincere good will is simply how I conduct my personal and professional life (in this industry, reputation is important...it really is pretty small).

Making a game is actually fairly low on the challenge scale. It is a lot of work, sure, but nothing really ridiculous (not even close...). I am extremely comfortable in making any asset needed for the game (environments, robots, characters... and so on). And the programming side of things I have the help I need to make that happen.

Don't worry, the game won't fail This campaign might fail, sure (though, honestly, it isn't going that poorly... we really are getting covered more and more. And even if the kickstarter doesn't get the funding, it will have still gotten the attention of investors to try another direction. I'm not quite as naive as some might believe ).

But there are many many ways to make it happen beyond being kickstarted. And, of course, we won't forget those who offered their help and pledged.



Here is a great video on dedication btw

 

[MuscleSpark]

This is our first attempt at kickstarter. I'm not sure why you think we tried before? We do have friends who have tried kickstarter in the past (such as the Blur movie that just got funded)... but nothing associated with us.

Really? That's weird, I'm sure I've seen this Kickstarter quite a while ago. What did you guys set as the time span for funding? Maybe I caught it when it had just started and got confused.

 

[Primordial Soup Nazi]

We definitely plan to do special things for those that back us in these early stages. We really aren't like other companies that intends to take your money and then forget who you are the next day. Those who support us now will never be forgotten or ignored (there is no other company who would make that promise, even those whom the community makes millions... they send you your swag and wash their hands of you). If you are really more concerned over saving 10 dollars than any of that, than what we are offering isn't what you are looking for.

We offer a unique relationship, something that goes beyond a discount on a single early release of a game. If the game works out, and the company survives, you will continue to see lots of special things just for those who were with us at the beginning now (and that is something you will find no other company saying).


We would love to have in-game footage...we would love to have the game to sell you right now But, well, we simply don't. And that is why we are coming to the community asking for help. We aren't trying to sell you something and run, we are asking for you to join us and lend us a hand with a few bucks. And for that, we are offering to work at living costs and will give our talents and immense amount of time to the project (beyond just a 9-5).

The stage we are at is the end of pre-production. We have the concepts, the story, the world fleshed out, the technology researched and ready to be thrown in, even a bunch of production models. That is what we are offering. If that isn't enough, that is totally understandable.

For those that see something special in what we do have to show and decide to support us, we won't forget you (no matter what happens with this campaign).

That is really the best we can say.

What you guys have to show looks very handsome, and having a game that is full-on "naturey" is actually fairly novel in the grand scheme of game settings.

But Metro is right; you really kind of shot yourselves in the foot with the $30-minimum-for-a-copy-of-the-game pricing structure. Its not that the game won't be worth that (hell, look at an AAA title like Diablo 3, which goes for twice that, but isn't worth anything beyond $5 to me...pardon my digression), but rather that a large part of the success of some of these gaming Kickstarters is based upon the knowledge that consumers love bargains, and selling a ton of advance copies at a very low price is a very viable marketing method.

Lets look at a notable, high profile recent success, Project Eternity (disclaimer: yes, this is all before taxes, failed transactions, and Kickstarter's/Amazon's cut):

At their minimum early-bird pricing for a copy of the game, $20, they sold all 25,000 of their allotted slots. There's $500,000 right there. The "didn't quite make it in time for early-bird pricing" tier, at $25, sold ~21,000 copies. And there's $420,000. So we've got $920,000 of their Kickstarter total of $3,986,929; as a very rough estimate, that's about a fourth of their funds. Just from the $20 and $25 dollar tiers.

Granted, you guys are a smaller outfit, with no celebrity developers/general studio street-cred. However, I suspect that, proportionately, you'd have a similar degree of success with a lower-priced bracket like PE and many others have adopted. Its important to keep in mind that Kickstarter fatigue is a very real phenomenon. None of these lofty games that people have been backing have come out yet, several promising projects have failed, and many people have already backed several projects (some backers are probably into the double-digits, I'm sure). Many backers (myself included) have adopted a wait-and-see approach to Kickstarter as of late, which isn't going to help projects like yours hit their quotas. Amongst other things, cheapo pricing is how you combat this.

If you guys have the means to alter your reward tiers, I strongly urge you to do so; as it is, you are virtually guaranteed to fall well-short of $150,000.

 

[Studio Fawn]

The problem with lower price higher volume strategies is that it is an economy of scale strategy (if you go look at smaller projects who receive less publicity, their lower economy of scale strategy tiers are killing them).

Project Eternity when it launched was covered across every news outlet (the same hour they went live... simultaneously everywhere... i watched it when it came up and searched for them online, and the internet was covered with articles that had been timed to release at the exact time it went live). From Kotaku to Forbes. It was featured on the front of Kickstarter for the entire campaign (in both the staff picks and the features and the popular projects). Basically...it was huge news with the backing of MAJOR media sponsorship. Their project was seen by millions of gamers (many probably had no clue who they were).

Now, compare that with our project. When we launched, there was no coverage (other than me running around to forums to post about it). Our project was buried many pages deep into kickstarters browsing of games. We aren't in the staff favorites. We have slowly climbed up the list through my own attempts at advertising. It wasn't until halfway into our first week that we first got a small article about it (because I send out press releases to all the websites I can...since we don't have a budget to hire a publicist). As of right now (over a week after launch) our project video has been seen 2,475 times (so we raise over a dollar for each view).

The difference isn't our pitches (we actually have WAY WAY more material and a stronger production in terms of video / presentation than a lot of projects do...look at what the Banner Saga's pitch was....it was nice, but they showed no engine and just a couple animated concept pieces.) ...the difference is simply eyes on the project.

I'm sure we would reach our goal if we were able to reach that type of volume of people as well... but...well... we aren't handed that type of success. In order to get into the media, I have to be aggressive ...put out more press releases... keep doing updates... and try to promote as best I can (which is how I found this thread, I look for who is covering the project each day).

Really, the difference isn't because of a few dollars in terms of rewards. It is simply the vast difference in coverage different projects get. Even some of the project you are probably watching now , if you go to kicktraq and see when they raised money... the first day they went out, they were likely followed with a huge hit in funding right away.

People respond pretty well to what we have to show. If we can just get them to see it....

 

[Studio Fawn]

If you guys have the means to alter your reward tiers, I strongly urge you to do so

Actually, once someone selects a reward tier... it can no longer be altered.

If we selected a 5 dollar for the game reward. We would need 30,000 people to donate. Which would mean we would need hundreds of thousands of people to see the video.

Again, we have 2,475 video views. We just can't compete with high volume low cost strategies.

At 30 dollars, we need simply 5,000 people to donate. So, even if our pricing turns away 4 out of 5... we are still far ahead in terms of how much we raise from number of views / donators.

 

[Primordial Soup Nazi]

The problem with lower price higher volume strategies is that it is an economy of scale strategy (if you go look at smaller projects who receive less publicity, their lower economy of scale strategy tiers are killing them).

I kind of doubt that the lower tiers are whats killing them. Even if there is a significant disparity of proportionate backing between a PE-type Kickstarter, and one of Bloom's scope, I still wouldn't anticipate accruing less than a fifth of your total Kickstarter funds from a $20-for-a-copy tier.

The difference isn't our pitches (we actually have WAY WAY more material and a stronger production in terms of video / presentation than a lot of projects do...look at what the Banner Saga's pitch was....it was nice, but they showed no engine and just a couple animated concept pieces.) ...the difference is simply eyes on the project.

I agree; I actually rather liked your pitch. It was quite professional for a small studio, and if those character concepts are yours, my hats off, sir.

In order to get into the media, I have to be aggressive ...put out more press releases... keep doing updates... and try to promote as best I can (which is how I found this thread, I look for who is covering the project each day).

Good on you (especially for having the balls to post here; there is much wisdom to be gleaned from the Codex...sandwiched between rampant vulgarity and borderline insanity, of course).

I agree with you that lack of publicity kills, but not that bargain prices for a copy of the game at a lower tier is detrimental. I can't possibly be the only one that sees $30 and thinks "too rich for my blood" for something that isn't either high-profile, or conceptually damn near close to their dream game (Dead State comes to mind for the latter). At the very least, I'm sure you can agree that a limited early-bird special would have helped.

If you are really more concerned over saving 10 dollars than any of that, than what we are offering isn't what you are looking for.

Its cool if you believe that, but don't market your game like this. Keep this opinion on the down-low. Please believe me when I say people are more concerned with getting a good game for cheap than they are with being individually recognized.

Either way, I hope Bloom gets made; seems like a worthwhile endeavor.

Edit:

If we selected a 5 dollar for the game reward. We would need 30,000 people to donate. Which would mean we would need hundreds of thousands of people to see the video.

Nobody is advocating that you sell your game for five dollars.

I hope you're right, and I'm wrong, but I doubt it.

 

[curry]

You have nothing to offer but words. No known developers, no prototype, nothing.

What are you still doing here?

I'd much rather see serious projects get the $$$

 

[Gurkog]

The game looks beautiful, but $30 is way out of my price range. Poor blokes like me only pledge at most $20 (except on Project Eternity because fanboy). The recent boom in Kickstarter projects hasn't helped any because it has sucked away all of my spare change. Anyway, I wish you all luck and will probably pick it up after release.

 

[Studio Fawn]

Thanks Since the rewards seem to be a big problem, I think I have an idea how to adjust them. I'll get it figured out in the next day or two and post the reworked system

 

[Metro]

Good to see a developer taking feedback in stride (most just go off in a huff). I know that, as a developer, there's a strong personal motivation not to 'devalue' your creative work. But again, the realities of the digital download era and Kickstarter is that bargains are what attracts people the most. Obviously there are people that are really struck with a particular game and are motivated to give more than the minimum but a very large part of the potential consumer base is just looking to reserve a copy of the game with no extra frills. There was a pretty lengthy discussion thread on this topic (indie game pricing) a while ago and it seemed most people here thought $15 was a good 'sweet spot.' Certainly there are always outliers (extreme cheapskates the extremely generous) but, again, it's about casting your net as wide as possible. At most I don't think you should charge anymore to 'preorder' the game then what you'd pay for it on release. That's just going to act as a disincentive to a lot of people.

 

[Zed]

you have more than 30 days left.
you could still add an "early bird" tier with a $5-10 discount for the first 100-200 backers., or something. that will help any exponential growth effects.

 

[octavius]

Bloom is an unfortunate name for a game.
I hate Bloom.

 

[Wizfall]

Very nice arts, congratz !
Maybe you should tell what kind of famous game it could be compared.
It looks like to have the same poetic vibe than Beyond good and evil.
While i enjoy this kind of game i like TB RPG more and with so many interesting projects going on i can only donate to the ones i like the most.
I hope you will make it because i could possibly buy it at release if it turns good.

 

[Burning Bridges]

The problem with lower price higher volume strategies is that it is an economy of scale strategy (if you go look at smaller projects who receive less publicity, their lower economy of scale strategy tiers are killing them).

Project Eternity when it launched was covered across every news outlet (the same hour they went live... simultaneously everywhere... i watched it when it came up and searched for them online, and the internet was covered with articles that had been timed to release at the exact time it went live). From Kotaku to Forbes. It was featured on the front of Kickstarter for the entire campaign (in both the staff picks and the features and the popular projects). Basically...it was huge news with the backing of MAJOR media sponsorship. Their project was seen by millions of gamers (many probably had no clue who they were).

That argument is way overused in my opinion.

Yes, niche products deserve higher unit prices but it's reserved for real niche products. Let's say you were making a realistic simulator of the Redstone rocket and simulate "exciting" missions like Shepard's 15 minute ballistic space flight, graphically accurate, in that the capsule had no real window. How many people would pay for that? Not many I guess. On the other hand, aren't there perhaps 500 such people who'd pay 100$ for it? Quite possible.

But c'mon an adventure game? It may be a nice game but if it shouldn't be made, there are enough other games. No one will give a damn if it isn't made.

Also, I think 150.000$ is too much. What is the minimum amount you need to make the game? How much is groceries, rent, electricity bills etc for 18 months and 2-4 guys? Factor in that you must provide half of that budget yourself - kickstarter isn't a welfare office for wannabe developers. So if you need 150k then aim for let's say 50 - 75k from kickstarter, provide the rest yourself, and balance the deficit after you finished the game. You believe in your game and are 100% dedicated, therefore you are going to complete it and it's going to be great, right? Then there is no great risk.

50k - 75k is realistic with your current pledge levels. Legends of Eisenwald made in that range, but just barely.

Or in very simple terms. Don't think maximalistic. We already told that to subassman, and he wouldn't listen. Failed miserably.

 

[Burning Bridges]

Also, you complain about coverage, or lack thereof. But what have you done during 2012 to promote your game? Did you provide information and gather feedback on forums (both your own and external), did contact people who wrote previews and articles? What is on your website to make people interested? Did you launch the website some time (i.e. at least 6 months) before? Or did you start just now that your kickstarter campaign began?