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Camelot Unchained: built on a foundation of dishonesty
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KS not funding 100% does not remove the fact that the developer has to provide literally nothing but an overview of the idea before he can scoop up the money. Nothing tangible needs to be exchanged for the $$ being donated.
From a purely economic standpoint of time = money, no such thing as a free lunch, etc,, and knowing MJ spent time on his proposal therefor it wasn't "free", sure I can agree it's not free money. But it's as close as you can get without suddenly coming into a large inheritance without having to lift a finger.
And you fail to address that KS is a not insignificant portion of the funding that will never have to be paid back, and will never dip into profit returns. I say any connected developer who uses KS as a means to fund a game is not doing it for the gamer so much as he's doing it for his own wallet, and saying otherwise truly is dishonest. (Looking at you, too, RG)
I think he was saying that it appears they have been able to change the public's perception from "it's an economical move" to "I'm doing it for the fans and to avoid publishers." He was pointing out that in the end, this is just a cash grab and there isn't anything inherently noble about taking money from the community instead of taking it from private investors that would expect a return. Actually, taking it from the community is often seen as less noble by many.
MJ has said KS will cost him 150k. He also has also built a reputation over 20 years of developing games which he is putting on the line with this project.
KS is not free, and only works if you have fans who truly believe in the project.
Its kind of funny how many finance gurus have shown up on this forum claiming to know more about how MMOs are finanaced than MJ.
If MJ could get the 2 million from a private investor who would allow him to make the game he wants I am sure he would have done so.
If you have any evidence that someone was willing to finance the game, but MJ chose to go with KS instead to make no money then please do share.
Those are you examples? Seriously?
Both of those games were disatsters that I am sure lost a lot of money. Do you really believe the performance of those 2 games would inspire publishers to invest in niche projects?
If anything those examples make it even less likely that anyone would want to touch a niche project.
QFT.
I don't think anyone was confused about the fact that the purpose of a Kickstarter is to raise money.
I don't think raising money precludes a person from having ideas, or makes them part of some conspiracy to deceive.
It just means they need money for a project - and Kickstarter is a nice way of also gauging whether there is enough interest in your niche project to support it.
So....to me this all says efficient and sensible, not EVIL CONSPIRACY or (for instance) A FOUNDATION OF DISHONESTY.
I will just go on one thing, "Never dip into profit returns"....What do you think giving people copies of the game, 3 years free subs, and $1 after that, and monthly discounts do? I would say it dips into profit, since you cannot sell people a game that they got for donating, and such.
IF you are not sold on an idea, or hate KS, do not give them money, I personally have never given one money, but I don't feel the need to tell people how to spend their money. If I ever did give one money, I would be giving them money with the attitude that if it all works out, great, if not, disappointing, but no big deal.
You can say some people give big money, but if the guy is a millionaire, then it is probably like most people giving $25-30, so then again, no big hit to them in the long run.
If you cannot afford for the money you give to vanish (not out of being scammed, but things happen), then do not give it. I can order the family pizza for $35-40, where I could of fed everyone with $10 at the grocery store, so I 'wasted' $25-30, buying food that is not a great value, do people sit outside of restaurants that charge $20+ for a steak and shame them for spending $30-40 per person on a meal?
Do most people need a cell phone that cost $500-700, that most pay for by a contract, we coud go on and on about how people waste food/money....In the end, if it isn't your money, why do you care, do you think people are too ignorant to know that bad things can happen to your money?
But you said companies cant get funding without the big publishers (or kickstarter). I point out they obviously can, and you just ignore that. And then of course there is EvE, which makes more revenue than its initial development cost every single month.
There is a big difference between DF and MO that make it attractive to an investor: Mark Jacobs. His chance at making the game he wanted to make was a huge success, his chance of making a game with interference was not.
Well, he had the choice of putting 5M money at stake and make the game, without knowing if enough people were interested, or give 2M and ask the players to give 2M too. Given than he promised he wouldn't use any of these 2M from KS for his own salary in the presentation video, and than he could have easily had a whole lot of players by adding PvE and other stuff, i don't think he is only interested by money.
About KS being something that "will never dip into profit returns", i think the lifetime sub at $250 is pretty disadvantageous for him. Paid back in less than 2 years of playing if you count the box price, and as it is one of the most popular, i would say it's almost like he was already using the money he would have made at launch and in the first month/years.
So KS fund does "dip into profit returns", unlike what you said.
With $2M put in, how many box would he need to sell to get his money back, assuming the game is very bad and no one keep his sub?
If he doesn't do a good game, that you'll want to spend years on it, he will lose heaps of money, so i'm pretty safe about that part.
To answer question 2, the reason CCP didn't have this problem of investor interference is because they were majority held and funded by CCP staff and founders.
From WIKI:
CCP was founded in June 1997 by Reynir Harðarson, Þórólfur Beck and Ívar Kristjánsson[7] for the purpose of making MMORPGs. In order to finance the initial development of Eve Online, CCP developed and published a board game in Iceland called Hættuspil ("Danger Game").[7][8] In April 2000 the company, with Sigurður Arnljótsson as CEO, raised $2.6 million, through a closed offering organized by Kaupthing Bank (now Arion banki), from private investors in Iceland, including the Icelandic telephone company <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Síminn" title="S
The OP is does not take into consideration f the current gaming landscape financially. The facts are PC games are dying and while companies still crank out MMOs in hopes of being the next WoW, the MMO genre is nowhere near the cash cow it was 5 or 6 years ago, that is why sub model games have gone F2P and you have seen the recent boom of F2P and B2P releases.
The reason these developers gravitate towards Kickstarter as a project funding source is because venture capitalist are not investing in PC/MMO games like they used to. Mobile gaming for mobile devices like phones and tablets have taken over the market. Mobile games cost less to produce and yield a higher return due to the accesibility of those games. The # of ppl in the population that own a smart phone and/or tablet is outrageously greater then the # of ppl in the population that own a PC that meet the minimum req. for modern day games.
Will these developrs make more money with their Kickstarter games? Sure they have potential to gain much more then what they would have with lots of investors, but I want them to make money! I want them to make lots of money! Again, PC games are dying and if companies can be financially succesful using Kickstarter to contribute in funding their projects I am all for it because I want these companies to continue making money so they can continue making games that I enjoy playing.
People sure are confused about the reason behind it for this particular project though.
Let's not play that game of demanding evidence that we know damn well would be impossible to find if we're not on the inside. I have no idea what his true financial options were, and neither do you. He could have had zero interested backers, or he could have had twenty. If his reputation is worth as much as you say it is, I'm inclined to believe he'd have very little trouble finding financing for a project like this which is much beloved by the fans of DAoC.
You're saying that he won't make any money at all from doing this, and I think that makes you either incredibly naive, or dishonest yourself. He's developing entertainment, not running a charity.
When it comes to risk it is good to know whose money that is at risk.
The only personal risk about swtor is that if the game does badly you find yourself out of a job, but if the game wouldn't be made you wouldn't have a job to begin with. The money that you risk is profit returns for stockholders. When it comes to trion, investors put 100 million dollars into the company before rift, and that money is partially used for defiance, so the risk is that investors don't get their money back.
With camelot unchained MJ is putting his reputation, his company and 2 million dollars of his own money on the line to create the game. Kickstarter is a way to get players passionate about the project but to say that he doesn't risk anything is a big fat lie.
Uh, you mean besides the fact that what you're suggesting is an entirely different concept for a game and not really even a true MMO? For people to be able to afford these servers, they aren't going to be able to host that many people. You're basically turning his vision for an RvR MMO into something like a fantasy based shooter (see Forge and/or Chivalry).
With all the copies of the game they are offering with KS, i doubt going BTP would get them any money...
I don't get what's your "acceptable rate". Are you talking about the sub? He already stated the sub would be cheaper than what's considered normal on the market.
About getting rid of the RvR for PvP, are you serious? It's like asking to a electric cars merchant to sell gasoline cars instead... gasoline may be more convenient than electricity in a lot of way and used by a lot more people, but that's not what we want.
So, MJ is the greedy bad guy, and we're the naive victims, but what about you, strangiato2112...
1: Are you interested in Camelot Unchained?
2: Are you backing the kickstarter?
3: If you could decide the total amount of $ pledged for this kickstarter (on behalf of all backers), what would the amount be?
I've backed this game, and so far haven't spent any more than i have for my last few MMOs that i grew bored of pretty rapidly.
I'm glad i backed it, as i'm really enjoying the "process" so far, and i hope it continues. The transparency in the game making is pretty cool. If, two years from now, he can make an MMO that holds my interest longer than the typical 3 months i have been getting, i hope he makes a ton of money off this. I miss the way MMOs used to be, call it rose colored glasses, or whatever you want, i just don't find them nearly as enjoyable as i used too.
Is this game the answer? No idea. But I really like his foundation principles, that started my interest. RvR? Giddy-up.
I hardly feel that Jacobs has been dishonest with me up to this point, and more power to him for trying something a little different, this genre can use all the different it can get.
With all that said, please don't think i was ignorant enough to think this was just some type of "political" move on his part when i hit the pledge button. I'm doing this for me, quite a bit more than for him. I'm hoping to get a game i really want to play, and i like what i have seen so far.
Hence why it is one of many, many ideas, and they are not offering copies on KS they are basically offering pre-orders, big difference,
Also to the poster above you: I know people with not that insane rigs who run emulators for certain high profile MMOs and manage to sustain a few thousand players without many issues (lag, instability, etc) ergo if CU has a total playerbase of 100.000 people and we take EVE as a rough indication of what population levels you're expecting daily then you're not looking at more than 10k on average, 20-30k during peak times but if you divide that population up between a few servers then you get back to saner levels of machines needed to run a server but therein lies the beauty of such an idea: if MJ and his team were to offer purpose built servers for rent at a monthly cost then they could basically ensure a continued source of revenue to keep developement going and pad pockets even which also if this sub-forum is anything to go by won't be a small amount. Eliminating RvRvR would aid in allowing freeform PVP between player groups (for territory or whatnot) and thus avoid the issue of having multiple private servers causing imbalanced populations over the 3 sides in any one given fight. Again just one of a plethora of ideas, most of which are arguably better than a niche game that further castrates its own chances of having enough people to do the actual pvp by having a barrier to entry.
That is very sweet of you
Could you tell me the name of the best MMO out there (or whichever comes closest)?
[mod edit] Kickstarter is a patronage system, and not an investment system. Everyone who pledges on kickstarter knows that they are not an investor in the product. They pledge to products because they want to see them made, and maybe get some token things in return. I guarantee you the vast majority of the backers of CU are backing the game simply because they want a real RvR old school game and believe in the foundational principles. [mod edit]
But you should be considered an investor. If he ends up getting millions of money from the game you won't see a penny. That's why he is going to kickstarter, because he doesn't have to worry about having to pay back investors later on.
I would give you a guest pass to SWOTR, but then I wouldn't be able to find a way to live with myself afterwards....
Well, DAoC was a MMO considered a great success, and Warhammer was released way too soon : http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/5674776#5674776 (post #26) and that's why he doesn't want any publishing company to be involved anymore.