Is BT4's funding level a disappointment for inXile?

[tyrannosaurus rex]

I think Fargo can pull in 4m for an isometric RPG any time, no questions asked.

No not at all. Wasteland wasn't released during the torment kickstarter, and Torment was the biggest gun he could use for isometric RPGs. But now Wasteland was released and we saw it for what it was, a mediocre game made by a try hard who wants to live the hollywood life again.

Now he tries something again and fails miserably. With his goal even higher he thought his hype was a crescendo about to deliver 6 million .

He ran one of the biggest gaming publisher to the ground, he will run this new company to the ground too.

 

[Infinitron]

Harebrained Schemes wish they could fail so miserably.

 

[tyrannosaurus rex]

Are we talking about proportions? He can barely meet his goal. Compared to torment? Lol.

But it's here that we see that it never was Fargo as a game designer that people wanted. It was the hype he was generating, first by riding on the massive kickstarter early hype with Wasteland where just about everything was funded by hipsters (you think that wasteland 2 was funded by cRPG nostalgics ), then riding on both Torment's reputation and the big numenera hype. And now he can barely meet his goal. The next kickstarter he's not going to reach it, especially with the big disappointment torment will be. IneXile will be back at shoving smartphones games and cheap enhanced editions of classics in about 5 years from now.

 

[Infinitron]

Too obvious, bro

 

[tyrannosaurus rex]

Booooo. Might as well just say I'm right.

 

[Gozma]

that shit with Shenmue is grotesque

bye bye kickstartah hopeyears

 

[Jaesun]

that shit with Shenmue is grotesque

bye bye kickstartah hopeyears

Many kickstarters have funding through other sources as well.

 

[Crooked Bee]

Yeah, Shenmue is hardly the first or only precedent. They really should've announced Sony's involvement in advance, though. Sorta like Kingdom Come did, i.e. "help us prove there's a demand for this."

 

[prodigydancer]

that shit with Shenmue is grotesque

bye bye kickstartah hopeyears

Hardly. Nobody's forcing people to pledge or to choose a particular project.

E.g. Zombicide: Black Plague is CoolMiniOrNot's 18th (!) Kickstarter in 4 years. And they'll probably hit $3m mark with it. Of course, tabletop games market is different from VG market but saying that it's impossible for an indie company to pull very successful KS campaigns consistently is pure denial.

 

[Pirata Alma Negra]

Does anyone really think Shenmue and BT4 are harvesting from the same audience?

This Fargo thing is like a pyramid scheme, it blows up soon or late.

 

[prodigydancer]

Does anyone really think Shenmue and BT4 are harvesting from the same audience?

Nope. BT4 campaign was fucked up right from the start. I won't list all problems, just the major ones:
1) They could announce it on E3 just like Sony did with Shenmue. Instead they picked a random date and the KS began just hours before the FO4 announcement.
2) The was no day one gameplay trailer. Any VG pitch without gameplay is weak.
3) It's well-known that first two days make or break your entire campaign, yet inXile completely dropped the ball. I understand that Brian was attending a funeral but he's not the whole damn company.

 

[theSavant]

Yeah they fucked it up, but still pulled a lot money. I personally trust their competence... but this campaign is amongst the worst.

Edit: wait... what's that...?!? OMG, I just received the "Savant" title. ZOMGOMGOMGOMGOMG...
I am "theSavant" having a "Savant" title in this forum. A personal dream has come true!

 

[Kz3r0]

Nope. BT4 campaign was fucked up right from the start. I won't list all problems, just the major ones:
1) They could announce it on E3 just like Sony did with Shenmue. Instead they picked a random date and the KS began just hours before the FO4 announcement.

Wrong, announcing it at E3 would only make things worse, SONY is a big corporation for which E3 exists Fargo is not.

2) The was no day one gameplay trailer. Any VG pitch without gameplay is weak.

Hundreds of Kickstarters prove you wrong.

3) It's well-known that first two days make or break your entire campaign, yet inXile completely dropped the ball. I understand that Brian was attending a funeral but he's not the whole damn company.

He is.

 

[Infinitron]

Eh, it all depends on what's going to happen now. There are 19 days left on the campaign. I think there's reason to believe they'll save a lot of meaty stuff for the last two weeks, after all the E3 stuff had died down. I can't believe they'd prepare 6 whole months just for an in-engine video (impressive as it is) and a couple of Brian Fargo Q&A vids.

Heck, I know for sure that the game has a Torment-style vision document.

 

[Zorba the Hutt]

I haven't been studying detailed comparisons of KS figures like some in this thread, but I thought the start was p. good - they certainly created the impression the campaign would succeed, at least. Sure, there are things they could do better, and hopefully will. But by offering the free games to get that good first day they basically cannibalised future sales as most who may have stayed on the fence or backed later on got in early instead. So things seem even flatter than usual now.

I suspect the reality, as many have said since long before the campaign started, is that the Bard's Tale just doesn't have the pull in today's market compared to name-dropping the likes of Torment or BG. Blobbers are a smaller niche and it's also an old name - I wonder what Wasteland would have got these days compared to the 2012 "we're changing the way games are made!" era. But it's obviously a very important franchise to Fargo on a personal level, given the history. I wonder what his real expectations were.

 

[ArchAngel]

It is not a coincidence that MCA left Obsidian. He is preparing the Van Buren KS so InXile does not need to fire all the extra developers that were supposed to work on BT4 if it got funding Fargo expected. MCA is his Plan B :D

 

[Pirata Alma Negra]

MCA designs an area VB stretch goal.

 

[Themadcow]

One thing that riled me was the pledge levels. $20 for the game is a frigging bargain... too cheap in all honesty, and that tells the higher level pledgers that in all likelihood they'll be able to get the game for about $12 within a few months on Steam. Conversely, the boxed editions were faaar too expensive. $95 (now $105 I think) to have a decent physical box rather than that LP style one is a right rip off. I'd have happily paid $60 or $65 for it but by comparison to the $20 tier it's just ridiculous. The only game I've backed at more than that so far was Chaos: Reborn and only because Julian Gollop deserves the cash.

So you get people like me who loves BT pledging at the $20 level instead of getting $65. That makes NO commercial sense when you consider the cost of physical materials isn't going to be close to $10 let alone the $75 difference in the pledge level - plus you'd get more backers which would reduce the cost of box / map production due to economies of scale.

I think Brian and Co are a little worried, they've seen the hardcore back the project on day 1 or 2 and now it looks like no-one outside the hardcore fans are interested in the project... and thats why they're stalling on important details that could change the scope of the game either towards the desires of the hardcore (pure blobber, hardcore saving, 6-8 person party, first person view) to the more general RPG fan (more story elements, 3rd party 'prettier' graphics, consoletard friendly save system etc).

 

[Apexeon]

8 Party members and I am in.

 

[Lady_Error]

One thing that riled me was the pledge levels. $20 for the game is a frigging bargain... too cheap in all honesty, and that tells the higher level pledgers that in all likelihood they'll be able to get the game for about $12 within a few months on Steam.

$20 for Early Birds is just fine to get the momentum going. They wanted to price it at $25 initially and people here complained that it would be too high.

8 Party members and I am in.

Most old school blobbers had 6 party members, which is what I would like to see. And from what they said so far, it looks like it would be 4 characters + 1 or 2 recruitable NPC's.

Though judging from the amount of complaints about the party size, they may decide to make the original party larger too.

 

[Themadcow]

Most old school blobbers had 6 party members, which is what I would like to see. And from what they said so far, it looks like it would be 4 characters + 1 or 2 recruitable NPC's.

6 player made characters in most old school blobbers, not CPCs though. BT1 had 6 PCs and a 'special slot' for binds or summons. Later BTs allowed you to have more summons / binds at the cost of your PC slots. Having your own decent sized group of hand made adventurers is as fundamental a part of BT as it is Wizardry.

 

[Volourn]

"But now Wasteland was released and we saw it for what it was, a mediocre game"

FUCK OFF.


P.S. Another vote for 6 party members.

 

[theSavant]

Damn... all the talk about 4 players party somehow gets me to the point, that I think 4 are indeed better than 6 or 8...

 

[Atchodas]

6 is usually a serious overkill especially if you make achievements for game to be soloable on highest difficulties cough shiternity cough

 

[Morkar Left]

6 is usually a serious overkill especially if you make achievements for game to be soloable on highest difficulties cough shiternity cough

What the fuck is wrong with you people?

I'm going back to dosbox for some real rpgs...