Game News Deathfire: Ruins of Nethermore Kickstarter is Live

[Zed]

To be honest, Guido left a certain disposition for the Codex going into this project. Some people will be against it regardless of how good it sounds.

Thorvalla sounded pretty good. The card-based battles caused some controversy but other than that I think many were quite interested in the idea (and Neal Hallford!). However, the Kickstarter was very ill-prepared. The concept was barely even established and the asking price (I think $1M?) was ridiculous.

Guido was not very humble when Thorvalla was failing. I recall him being critical towards other devs and industry connections on twitter for not being his pal and not doing shoutouts for his project. At the same time he didn't take criticism and suggestions very well. He blamed the concept rather than himself and the pitch when it ultimately failed.

I think Thorvalla had the concept (and Neal Hallford!), but lacked the proof of concept and the proper pitch.
I think Deathfire has a much better proof of concept, but has a pretty boring concept and not a much better pitch.

 

[Gord]

The numbers speak for themselves. Why do even more unknown games succeed while Deathfire doesn't? And don't tell me there isn't an audience for blobbers (although this won't be a pure blobber), as Grimrock sold well.

Sorry, didn't know you are a fortune teller, giving you the ability to know after less than one day if a Kickstarter is successful or not...


Maybe he's afraid that the whole "look, I'm an famous game dev from the days of yore and even if I haven't done anything great in the last 20 years, I'll totally be doing a great game now" is getting old already? Don't know.
If he gets some media attention (which is happening already) and one or two other big Kickstarters to drop his name, I don't see much reason why it shouldn't succeed, even if he did one or two minor mistakes (but then again, which Kickstarter didn't?).

 

[General Maxson]

The numbers speak for themselves. Why do even more unknown games succeed while Deathfire doesn't? And don't tell me there isn't an audience for blobbers (although this won't be a pure blobber), as Grimrock sold well.

Sorry, didn't know you are a fortune teller, giving you the ability to know after less than one day if a Kickstarter is successful or not...


Maybe he's afraid that the whole "look, I'm an famous game dev from the days of yore and even if I haven't done anything great in the last 20 years, I'll totally be doing a great game now" is getting old already? Don't know.
If he gets some media attention (which is happening already) and one or two other big Kickstarters to drop his name, I don't see much reason why it shouldn't succeed, even if he did one or two minor mistakes (but then again, which Kickstarter didn't?).

We shall see, won't we?

I wish him luck though.

 

[Gord]

That we will.

 

[Grunker]

he reminds me of Vault Dweller

Vault Dweller would charge $500 for access to a class?

To be honest, Guido left a certain disposition for the Codex going into this project. Some people will be against it regardless of how good it sounds.

Thorvalla sounded pretty good. The card-based battles caused some controversy but other than that I think many were quite interested in the idea (and Neal Hallford!). However, the Kickstarter was very ill-prepared. The concept was barely even established and the asking price (I think $1M?) was ridiculous.

Guido was not very humble when Thorvalla was failing. I recall him being critical towards other devs and industry connections on twitter for not being his pal and not doing shoutouts for his project. At the same time he didn't take criticism and suggestions very well. He blamed the concept rather than himself and the pitch when it ultimately failed.

I think Thorvalla had the concept (and Neal Hallford!), but lacked the proof of concept and the proper pitch.
I think Deathfire has a much better proof of concept, but has a pretty boring concept and not a much better pitch.

Bull's Eye. What's worse, was when people chimed in with well-meaning "hey, don't worry Guido, just restart and work a little more on your pitch" he would post comments like "well if people don't like the concept what can I do?" and then rant about how the world was unfair and he was just small Guido with the whole world against him, proving he had missed the point entirely.

I hope this produces a good game in the end. As bull-headed as Guido seems to be though, I strongly doubt it. It's a shame.

 

[FeelTheRads]

Vault Dweller would charge $500 for access to a class?

No, but he charges $50 for an interactive novel.

 

[felipepepe]

This has "Shadowrun Returns" written all over it.

How so? What was wrong with SRR's KS?

Guess he means that it's gonna end up like SRR?

Yeah, all the systems and features, all unbalanced, underutilized and overall broken.

 

[Grunker]

Vault Dweller would charge $500 for access to a class?

No, but he charges $50 for an interactive novel.

ZING

 

[Wizfall]

I'm interested by the game/concept.
I don't care too much about the personality of the developer if i'm confident he could deliver.
I don't need a "circus" , a great communication skill guy to pledge and i don't need Guido to sweat talk me.
Guido suck at communication and kickstarter sure.
But the only concrete "gaming" fault is the exclusive class, it's a stupid idea but disregarding the game only for that is too much.
Because otherwise the games looks good and he has a lot more to show than other successful project.

A shame some people here, which is supposed to be quite hardcore place, judge the personality/presentation and not the game/concept.
This is why the world sadly need marketing and PR guys.

 

[theSavant]

Well then he should have set a more "realistic" goal like 100K or something, if he needs the funds badly. All I'm saying what will he do if this fails meeting its goal (and it probably will).

I agree with you there. The intuition tells that 400K is just too high for his lacking popularity. 100K would have been realistic to achieve. However 100K is nothing if you are fully dependent on this money, e.g. 5 people working full time on it, living on 20K/year. Unfortunately I see the campaign reaching 150K at max

 

[felipepepe]

A shame some people here, which is supposed to be quite hardcore place, judge the personality/presentation and not the game/concept.
This is why the world sadly need marketing and PR guys.

MAYBE people are judging precisely the game/concept, and more over, the ability of the company to deliver it, instead of going "oh, the feature list has everything I want, I'm sure it will be perfect!".

 

[Name]

Guido needs some pal to help him with social interaction and human understanding. He sounds more like a flawed genius now. So he can focus on game insteand of campaign and stuff. I wonder how he became a producer back then.

 

[stony3k]

My comparison to Vault Dweller was not regarding the pitch but the fact that he doesn't seem to want to pimp himself for the game and that he does seem pretty arrogant and set about his ideas (sorry VD ). VD has posted numerous times about how KS requires you to market yourself and not your game and I see Guido trying to do the opposite here.

Edit: arrogance is actually a good thing in a game designer. Think Steve Jobs - he never tried to listen to what the market was telling him, he just went out and defined his vision and created the markets

 

[Zombra]

I think this has a better chance of reaching to goal than Thorvalda, although exclusive stuff for Kickstarter is fucking stupid and afaik has almost always backfired.

Haha.

Backfire: Ruins of Never Getting Funded

OK, that was just mean.

 

[stony3k]

Guido needs some pal to help him with social interaction and human understanding. He sounds more like a flawed genius now. So he can focus on game insteand of campaign and stuff. I wonder how he became a producer back then.

IIRC he was essentially forced into the role. He thought he was being hired as a developer but ended up being a producer. And by all accounts he ended up alienating a lot of the team (so his people skills have always been lacking)

 

[Grunker]

A shame some people here, which is supposed to be quite hardcore place, judge the personality/presentation and not the game/concept.
This is why the world sadly need marketing and PR guys.

MAYBE people are judging precisely the game/concept, and more over, the ability of the company to deliver it, instead of going "oh, the feature list has everything I want, I'm sure it will be perfect!".

now now, felipepepe, are you sure people aren't just retarded newfags who have never played games before 2002?

 

[Koschey]

I do enjoy snarking about Guido now and then, but still I had an open mind about pledging, depending on his pitch. Was already somewhat annoyed by the exclusive item deals he mentioned before the campaign start but went to the KS page ready to pledge anyway, probably to go for the cheapest boxed version. So I start reading the pitch, chuckling a bit when I note the 'suspicious' lack of inXile or Obsidian endorsements (delicious butthurt ) and what do I see?

A 500$ KS-exclusive ingame class!?

Yes, I read the update, but COME ON! Is he trying to market the game to both blobber fans and casual P2W suckers at once? Should have asked Garriot for an endorsement then

And if that wasn't already enough, the first possible stretchgoal is optional switching between first person blobber combat and third person 'tactical' combat. Two different combat systems, hopefully both balanced internally and between each other? What about positioning, important in third person, non-existant in first person?

Doesn't exactly inspire confidence in Guido's current design and fund management skills. I'll pass on this pitch.

 

[FeelTheRads]

Fargo tweeted about it actually, and I've seen inXile people pledge to it. Not sure about Obsidian.
So I wonder if there are indeed hard feelings at work here or he's just so hard headed and insists of doing it on his own powers alone.

 

[Koschey]

I don't doubt inXile and Obsidian are cool with endorsing the game, it's Guido who is often passive-aggressively bitching about the BI days in interviews. Both Fargo and MCA are pretty omnipresent as far as endorsements in high-profile KS pitches go, it's really noticable to see neither of their names in a pitch like this. Well, whatever his reasons, definitely a case of Guido not asking.

 

[theSavant]

What about positioning, important in third person, non-existant in first person?

Positioning works great in first person, see Wizardry 8.

 

[Gord]

It's been barely running for one day guys! It's the whole D:OS kickstarter all over again.
People where talking about how it had already failed and how this dev or that dev not backing it was a bad sign just the same.
Give it a few days and we will know more - wasn't there this article about how you allegedly could quite accurately predict success within less than a week or so?

Pretty sure it wasn't within less than a day, though.

 

[Infinitron]

It's not even running for one day guys! It's the whole D:OS kickstarter all over again.
People where talking about how it had already failed and how this dev or that dev not backing it was a bad sign just the same.
Give it a few days and we will know more - wasn't there this article about how you allegedly could quite accurately predict success within less than a week or so?

Pretty sure it wasn't within less than a day, though.

I don't recall people saying the D:OS Kickstarter was going to fail. Not many, at least. We did think it was going to underperform, though.

 

[Koschey]

I never said something about the lack of endorsements being a sign of failure. I just said they got a chuckle out of me because I'm a sick fuck and derive pleasure from the misery and butthurt of others.

Also, what the Tron said.

 

[~RAGING BONER~]

oh man, another d.o.a for Henkel...

its gotta be rough.

 

[Monty]

arrogance is actually a good thing in a game designer. Think Steve Jobs - he never tried to listen to what the market was telling him, he just went out and defined his vision and created the markets

I agree, but then you need the conviction to stand by your vision. So either do it your way, or listen to your customers - Henkel tries to have to both ways. So for example he comes up with a name everyone dislikes - instead of telling everyone to get used to it as it isn't changing, or changing it to something else, he assembles a focus group. Then announces the name isn't changing anyway as after much explanation the focus group were apparently ok with it.

Now he announces a stretch goal of 3rd person tactical combat, for the game he's pitched as a blobber.

It just seems a bit of a confused mess, which is putting off potential backers instead of attracting them.