Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

Game News Shaker Kickstarter Cancelled

Zed

Codex Staff
Patron
Staff Member
Joined
Oct 21, 2002
Messages
17,068
Codex USB, 2014
Tags: Brenda Brathwaite; Hero-U: Rogue to Redemption; Loot Drop; Shaker; Tom Hall; Transolar Games

For people with an eye on the Kickstarter campaign for Brenda Brathwaite and Tom Hall's Shaker, it may not come as a complete surprise that it was cancelled today. With half the time remaining, the campaign managed to raise a quarter of the target million dollars.

Ultimately, our pitch just wasn't strong enough to get the traction we felt it needed to thrive. Sure, it may have made it. We could have fought our way to a possibly successful end. In reading your feedback and talking it over internally, however, we decided that it made more sense to kill it and come back with something stronger.​

Hopefully their next attempt will have some more substance from the get-go. Perhaps with a little less industry endorsement and a little more game to show.

In other Kickstarter-related news:
Corey and Lori Coles's Hero-U: Rogue to Redemption has managed to raise nearly $60k of their target $400k, and it's still in its first day.
 

Goral

Arcane
Patron
The Real Fanboy
Joined
May 4, 2008
Messages
3,564
Location
Poland
They've basically admitted that they were making things up as they went and that they thought that just because they've mentioned some good titles people would suddenly throw money at them. Now they expect that someone (anyone) will believe them once they will finally finish making shit up? To me they are burned.
 

Volourn

Pretty Princess
Pretty Princess Glory to Ukraine
Joined
Mar 10, 2003
Messages
24,948
Why come back? They suck, their kickstarter, their deisgn sucked, they just plain sucked. Fuck 'em.
 

Bulba

Learned
Joined
Nov 1, 2010
Messages
518
doen't it involve making shit up in every game? not that I want to defend those guys...
 

Black

Arcane
Joined
May 8, 2007
Messages
1,873,024
Gee, you'd think tards would give people's wallets some time to rest and fill up after Double Fine, Obsidian, inXile, Shadowrun and many other kickstarter projects had just started but no, GIVE 1 MILLION NOW.

Work on your timing.
 

Esquilax

Arcane
Joined
Dec 7, 2010
Messages
4,833
Gee, you'd think tards would give people's wallets some time to rest and fill up after Double Fine, Obsidian, inXile, Shadowrun and many other kickstarter projects had just started but no, GIVE 1 MILLION NOW.

Work on your timing.

I think that those initial speculations of Kickstarter fatigue are bullshit. Clearly if all of those projects managed to get funded many times what they initially asked for, your mythical Kickstarter fatigue isn't to blame. It was because the pitch was shit.
 

CrustyBot

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Dec 29, 2011
Messages
814
Codex 2012
Cleve taking out the competition.

:smug:

Really though, they just had NFI what they were doing.
 

Wizfall

Cipher
Joined
Oct 3, 2012
Messages
816
I don't believe in kickstarter fatigue too.
Their pitch video was awfull and their campaign management wasn't better.
But i kind of like their story (except for having a predetermiined character) and the suggested gameplay.
Next time they better tell clearly what they want to do from the start because i think a Wizardry 8 "spiritual successor" kickstarter could raise a good amount of money.
 

commie

The Last Marxist
Patron
Joined
May 12, 2010
Messages
1,865,252
Location
Where one can weep in peace
Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Divinity: Original Sin 2
Tom and Brenda are the old style of devs (1980's-1990's era) with almost no marketing nous for the new age. I've no doubt they could pull of a great RPG given the resources, but it's just their ability to get those resources that is the problem. They obviously had too much enthusiasm(and desperation) and too little concrete stuff and virtually no roadmap or plan for how to get their KS across. Obsidian and inXile had prepared for ages beforehand and even though their initial pitches had no real details about the game, their vision was sound and focused and they knew how to ramp it up at regular intervals. Even Obsidian was really criticised here by many for 'mismanaging' their KS, starting with almost no detail, yet it became wildly successful because they figured out how to maximize pledges at every step. The masterstroke was not releasing any detail about the actual world, instead just giving an overview of what kind of game they were trying to make. This got the initial funding and then there was a nice surge whenever an update went out with actual detail and new stretch goals. Shaker had nothing like that.
 

FeelTheRads

Arcane
Joined
Apr 18, 2008
Messages
13,716
Speaking of which, why the hell did they start with stretch goals already laid out? That seems pretty stupid to me. You keep those to encourage more pledges after the first goal is achieved.
 

Volourn

Pretty Princess
Pretty Princess Glory to Ukraine
Joined
Mar 10, 2003
Messages
24,948
Comparing them to Obsidian is poor 9despite my abshing of this earlier). Obsidian is pretty much as close to a AAA developer you can get Theya re a sizeable company with major success in recent eyars. They hada game sell 5mil+ copies. They have had other multi million selling games. They gets lots of press.

I bet if BIO (unlikely since they are tied to a publisher) had a KS, they would get $5mil in donations easy. Or think how much a Bethesda, SS, or Blizzard could get.
 

commie

The Last Marxist
Patron
Joined
May 12, 2010
Messages
1,865,252
Location
Where one can weep in peace
Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Divinity: Original Sin 2
Comparing them to Obsidian is poor 9despite my abshing of this earlier). Obsidian is pretty much as close to a AAA developer you can get Theya re a sizeable company with major success in recent eyars. They hada game sell 5mil+ copies. They have had other multi million selling games. They gets lots of press.

I bet if BIO (unlikely since they are tied to a publisher) had a KS, they would get $5mil in donations easy. Or think how much a Bethesda, SS, or Blizzard could get.

Well it's not comparing them directly as of course Obsidian are a large, established studio and Loot Drop are just three names, only one of which would actually maybe be recognised by the gaming public at large. Having said that, the basic principles of getting a KS to work apply for everyone. Dead State got funded for fucks sake and even though I'm not really convinced by it yet I threw my money down because of the modest goal and the fact that they brought something to the table. DS KS also wasn't that great but it was enough obviously, and that's the difference. Shaker didn't know what the hell it was trying to be, what direction it was heading in, hell they even offered a separate RPG as a stretch goal!
 

Jarpie

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Oct 30, 2009
Messages
6,673
Codex 2012 MCA
The big mistake Loot Drop did was that they didn't have anything. The succesful Kickstarter needs to have at least some basic info and what I've found, it needs to set up what will be the "feel" of the game; Project Eternity this did very well, Wasteland 2 did as well, Legends of Eisenwald too, so did Jane Jensen.

It does not have to be anything concrete like screeshots or definite design but when I watched and read the Project Eternity pitch, I knew what will be the "feel" of the game.

When I watched and read Loot Drop's pitch, I had no fucking idea how it'll be and their updates didn't help at all. When they presented their updates it pretty much felt like they've just thrown them together in five minutes.

They have most probably already lost people since Shaker left very bad after taste - and once you lose your customers they're not coming back. If they do come back to Kickstarter they need completely new pitch, settting and basicly everything, the moment people smells Shaker in it, they're gone.
 

Minttunator

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Sep 26, 2012
Messages
1,651
Location
Estonia
Codex 2012 Codex 2013 Codex 2014 PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 RPG Wokedex Strap Yourselves In Codex Year of the Donut Codex+ Now Streaming! Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Codex USB, 2014 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pathfinder: Wrath
Bad timing, not a very good initial pitch, not enough information about the actual game.

The important thing is that people don't jump to the conclusion that there is no interest in that type of RPG - there is, it just needs to be presented a bit better.
 

Cleveland Mark Blakemore

Golden Era Games
Übermensch Developer
Joined
Apr 22, 2008
Messages
11,676
Location
LAND OF THE FREE & HOME OF THE BRAVE
They've basically admitted that they were making things up as they went and that they thought that just because they've mentioned some good titles people would suddenly throw money at them. Now they expect that someone (anyone) will believe them once they will finally finish making shit up? To me they are burned.

One step short of confessing to running a financial scam and in their own words. But next time they will be serious. No really. They admitted they had been making it up as they went along.

In case anybody missed it this shows enormous contempt for people in general, including admitting they were lying after the fact.
 

Ogg

Prophet
Patron
Joined
Jan 14, 2008
Messages
1,005
Location
River Seine
Codex 2012 Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Codex USB, 2014 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 BattleTech
they thought that just because they've mentioned some good titles people would suddenly throw money at them. Now they expect that someone (anyone) will believe them once they will finally finish making shit up? To me they are burned.
Well they actually gathered 250k$. I already find it hard to believe considering the poor quality of their pitch and overall campaign. People did throw money at them despite their lack of preparation. Sadly, like DU, I'm certain they will come back with a lower threshold and sheeple will donate. That's the very nature of fandom.
 

Trash

Pointing and laughing.
Joined
Dec 12, 2002
Messages
29,683
Location
About 8 meters beneath sea level.
The idea of Kickstarter is that devs show their ideas and pitch them to their customer base. The Wasteland 2 team had little to show apart from big time industry names and that one hauled in the millions. Loot Drop did do pretty much the same and didn't, despite a trackrecord of people who worked on classics such as the Wizardry series, Anachronox and Doom. The flak they're getting is ridiculous. These people are not the pr suits that ruined the industry to begin with, they are developers. People now basically demand a return of the pr folk before shelling out. Way to validate the industry.
 

DarkUnderlord

Professional Throne Sitter
Staff Member
Joined
Jun 18, 2002
Messages
28,505
I bet if BIO (unlikely since they are tied to a publisher) had a KS, they would get $5mil in donations easy.
I'm actually waiting to see how long it is before the smart exec at EA realises how much of a free ride they can get and try it.
 

tuluse

Arcane
Joined
Jul 20, 2008
Messages
11,400
Serpent in the Staglands Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Shadorwun: Hong Kong
The idea of Kickstarter is that devs show their ideas and pitch them to their customer base. The Wasteland 2 team had little to show apart from big time industry names and that one hauled in the millions. Loot Drop did do pretty much the same and didn't, despite a trackrecord of people who worked on classics such as the Wizardry series, Anachronox and Doom. The flak they're getting is ridiculous. These people are not the pr suits that ruined the industry to begin with, they are developers. People now basically demand a return of the pr folk before shelling out. Way to validate the industry.
No, we demand an actual game to be pitched, not just saying "old school rpg" 100 times.
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom