Funding & Budget

[Valkaern]

My understanding is that investors and budgeting possibilities were still being explored, unless I missed something. As I have no inside information I'm imagining based on what we do know that the initial budget will likely be quite a bit smaller than the average big name MMOs we've seen recently with $50-$250 million budgets.

With that in mind and considering the recent success of Double Fine Adventures funding approach (nearly 2 million pledged while the goal was only 400k), has any consideration been given to using Kickstarter? Or is the potential for reaching the goal through that means too small to be realistic?

I would imagine the niche of people desperate for this type of game could be passionate enough to pull off some impressive amounts.

[MendedWall12]

Valkaern wrote:

My understanding is that investors and budgeting possibilities were still being explored, unless I missed something. As I have no inside information I'm imagining based on what we do know that the initial budget will likely be quite a bit smaller than the average big name MMOs we've seen recently with $50-$250 million budgets.

With that in mind and considering the recent success of Double Fine Adventures funding approach (nearly 2 million pledged while the goal was only 400k), has any consideration been given to using Kickstarter? Or is the potential for reaching the goal through that means too small to be realistic?

I would imagine the niche of people desperate for this type of game could be passionate enough to pull off some impressive amounts.

I'd like to second this inquiry. Double Fine's recent and history-making success shows that if you have a game that is of particular interest, even to what company big-wigs would call a niche audience, people will come out and support it. I for one would have no problem dropping a month's worth of coffee money into seeding this game.

[Valkaern]

Exactly, I can only speak for myself but it's pretty clear through friends and game social communities I've been a part of, I'm not the only one who would consider spending a lot more than the average cost of a game if it were going towards funding something that suited me and could potentially result in a long term hobby.

I could easily justify at least the amount we see some games charging for lifetime subs (£100-£150), and likely more for something that appears to be ticking most of the boxes on my dream game list.

[Nihimon]

Someone mentioned Kickstarter in another thread. I for one would love to be able to kick in a couple hundred bucks as a micro-investor.

[Vic Wertz]

We're considering a lot of things. Stay tuned!

[Valkaern]

Nice, thanks.

I'm not sure how it all works on a technical level, so I'm not sure if a mix is even possible.

If a mix of funding sources is possible, based on what I know so far I'd be willing to pledge around £150 so far - more of course if you do exactly as I say!

Then again I'm not familiar enough with Kickstart to be aware of any drawbacks there may be. It just looks like such a good move on paper.

[Skamander]

This project is exciting enough that I'd also be willing to kick something in upfront if needed.

[DiSkOrD]

woah, so they got 2 millions now?

nice one, why were companies not thinking of that earlier?

it's a great way to cut out the middle man, although i do believe that paizo is not exactly a poor company.

anyways i might chip in some ca$h if the oppertunity would present itself.

[BlackUhuru]

Ryan should hook up with Raph Koster and Richard Garriot lol.

There not into building MMO's right now but both have browser based publishers and might be interested in investing. Even Dr. Richard Bartle might chip in few mill lol.

But in all seriousness I feel Ryan is a master of marketing and will do very well in pursuit of investors. I just hope they publish the game in house and stay away from having to many big suits in the office calling shots...

[Nihimon]

BlackUhuru wrote:

I just hope they publish the game in house and stay away from having to many big suits in the office calling shots...

I'm going to cry tears of rage if I ever see Sony's name attached to this.

[Valkaern]

Nihimon wrote:

BlackUhuru wrote:

I just hope they publish the game in house and stay away from having to many big suits in the office calling shots...

I'm going to cry tears of rage if I ever see Sony's name attached to this.

I'm having a hard time thinking of any traditional and current publishers that I'd actually be pleased to see. I know it's unreasonable. I realize I've become quite jaded after years of disappointment, but I didn't really understand how deep it ran until I tried to think of a publisher I'd be happy to see and came up blank.

It's hard not to be jaded after enduring years of shallow clones that drifted further and further away from capturing the PnP spirit these games initially seemed to be trying to recreate. They just seem to add limitations when I'd have assumed the goal was to remove as many as possible.

I distinctly recall thinking many times in the early days 'Wow, can you *imagine* what these games could be like by 2010? I can't wait!'. 'Past' me probably would have jumped ship well before the addiction took hold if I'd had any idea of what 2004-2011 would be like for MMOs :)

[Malarious]

I am sure if needed they could easily start taking pre-subscriptions, maybe some transactions, etc. We will know if they want to get funding rolling further, as they have plenty of avenues.

Like Limited Edition uniforms for pre-buyer funders!

[Valkenr]

Nihimon wrote:

BlackUhuru wrote:

I just hope they publish the game in house and stay away from having to many big suits in the office calling shots...

I'm going to cry tears of rage if I ever see Sony's name attached to this.

Yeah, that would suck when the game is going down for months at a time, because sony doesn't know how to buy up to date security software. Not to mention the addition of 'XP' and 'Levels' a few years down the road when Blizzard releases its next MMO.

[Onishi]

Valkenr wrote:

Nihimon wrote:

BlackUhuru wrote:

I just hope they publish the game in house and stay away from having to many big suits in the office calling shots...

I'm going to cry tears of rage if I ever see Sony's name attached to this.

Yeah, that would suck when the game is going down for months at a time, because sony doesn't know how to buy up to date security software. Not to mention the addition of 'XP' and 'Levels' a few years down the road when Blizzard releases its next MMO.

Heh sony's mistake was even bigger than being cheap... Their security hole was an apache server that was like 6 years behind on patches (the main difference being, there was nothing they needed to purchase, the patches they should have applied are free). You can't even blame that on cheapness, that is a lazy/incompetent security team there... Heck Sony's security team is also responsible for creating the worlds first... plain text capcha system (I wish I were joking).

Ignoring the inattention to security yeah they are also known for completely derailing every game they purchase, completely reversing major ideas. If I recall in the star wars game they bought, Jedi was originally a huge end reward (Unlocking it pretty much involved maxing out everything), a huge time investment that pretty much took literally years of gaming time. Before of course Sony decided it would be better to change it to an automatically unlocked starting class, and compensating those who earned it beforehand... with a decorative cape. (Now whether the cost of jedi was legit to begin with is fair to debate, but a few years into a game's life, it is too late to change that).

So yeah I also second the vouch, please do not ever consider selling out to sony!

[Forlarren]

If it wasn't for Sony there wouldn't have been Jedi at all. The break down of the game started when everyone started grinding random classes because their holocron told them too. Many of the first to go were the merchants. Having the money to grind through the fastest they abandoned their markets in mass. Before holocrons and Jedi knowing a good weapon smith meant a major advantage. A fully optimized gun wasn't that much better than the average but it was enough, that when combined with the other dozens of small optimizations that were possible, you could really dominate a battlefield.

I remember myself and a small group were able to dominate PvP, not because of greater numbers, or even throwing money at the problem but because we had great relationships with our crafters. We would spend days hunting down and collecting the best of the best mats. Our crafters on the other hand would spend days figuring out the perfect combination of armor, cloths, weapons, foods, ect. to make us almost invincible. There was no way to reach that level just by buying stuff from the market. You had to be involved, you had to know people, and above all you had to participate. No crafter would take on those uber personalization jobs for money alone, but deliver them a stack of rare hides from some out of the way corner of Dantooine before the next reset and they would be willing to do almost anything.

I was one of the very few master Rangers on my server so I was always arranging off planet hunt and collects. It wasn't that long before I stopped worrying about money at all. I would just drop off mats and once in a while I would get an email saying my armor and/or weapons were ready. For a while I actually managed to transcend the economy. I was doing what I was doing just for the fun of it. It was some of the most fun I have ever had in an MMO dating all the way back to MUDs.

All that died when the Jedi grind stared. Nobody wanted to waste time perfecting a squad. Those that did couldn't make a living because the market was saturated with ground out crap in epic proportions. It was a very sad day for MMOs.

[Bromton]

I think a look at the Kiva Model of how to get many people in and rewarded for investing on a loan/investment might help in building an investment with multiple persons each with a sub-percentage of the total investment in that block of funding.
Think of it as a investment Fund raiser with a thermometer each micro transaction is recorded to an account for the individual investor but the motivator is none of it is used until the total investment block is made.

Like a Ron Paul Money Bomb it is the small flow of cash that pays off people every week/month putting in 20 dollars not just to play a game but now you can own a piece of it that will earn a return on investment through enjoyment and subsidizing your gaming habit with Dividends/Money!

Sign Me Up! take my cash and make THE game of the decade!

[Brady Blankemeyer]

I would gladly donate a family member in servitude... or donate some money. My touch on MMO's have been almost getting put to the back burner as the recent games haven't excited me; my interests have only be rekindled by games like ArcheAge, Secret World and now this.

With what I've read so far in the Blog I'm really excited in seeing this game come out. So many possibilities of characters have been forming in my head so I'd gladly donate what I could to help this game out.