Veeno

Well that's just stupid. I would certainly say Star Citizen (to which I linked above) qualifies to be considered an AAA game. The fact that the size of the budget is the only thing that matters is just... just infinitely stupid.

That is exactly my point. It's not "holding a developer hostage", it actually is simply direct quality control by the players themselves. Investing in the development of a video game yourself makes you... well... much more invested in the success or failure of the video game. Developers who make bad games will be punished by losing reputation and trust and developers who make good games will be rewarded by gaining reputation and trust and, hence, being able to gather more funds upon their further crowdfunding campaigns. It wouldn't cause "survival of the fittest", it would cause "culling of the most unfit", where "fitness" actually is the quality of the games the developer makes. You remember how BioWare made that god-awful ending in ME3 that made absolutely no sense and how a lot of gamers were outraged by that and how there were a lot of blog/news articles talking about how that's just "gamers feeling entitled when they don't have the right to be"? In this crowdfunding system, players actually would not only have the right to be outraged at something like that, but the developer who made that game would most probably never be able to successfully crowd-fund the development of another video game again, while here is BioWare, merrily chugging along like nothing happened.

Eventually there will have to be a crowdfunded video game project which fails. Let's just hope it happens as late as possible and that the current "big three" - Double Fine Adventure, Wasteland 2 and Project Eternity - will do great and garner a nice reputation for Kickstarter and crowdfunding in general.

By the way, people talking about AAA games with multiplayer, fancy engines, physics and graphics? Check this baby out.

http://www.gog.com/en/gamecard/faster_than_light What makes you think it's not unlikely?

As is the case in nearly the entire market (not just software), most people just assume that "more expensive" = "better". Likewise, for video games most people assume that "more money poured into it" = "a better game". The market has been conditioning people to think that way for a long time because it's much easier to just pour more and more money into a video game than it is to make better and better video games. Hopefully in the future people will start realising that size of budget doesn't equal quality of a video game, and maybe Kickstarter is exactly what will help make that happen.

Nope.

We all probably agree with you, but publishers (the current rulers of the market) don't, for one simple reason - it benefits the strongest (richest) publishers for voice acting, fancy graphics and physics and other whatnots to be what determines the AAA status of a game, because the biggest and richest publishers will be capable of producing games with higher quality voice acting, graphics, physics etc. than smaller publishers, thus ensuring that it is their games that keep getting the AAA status. You remember how Skyrim was nominated for Game of the Year award like half a year before it was even released? Yeah.

No, it is not foolish. It's foolish to say otherwise. That kind of money does not go directly to the devs in that kind of timeframe in any instance. Ever. If a game doesn't get distributed by Wal-Mart or Steam, it is not recouping a $20 million budget. Blizzard doesn't sell copies of DIablo 3 in Wal-Mart and Gamestop just for fun. They do it because tons of people WOULD NOT buy it if it wasn't on a shelf at Gamestop and Wal-Mart. Not ONLY does it not follow that money that goes into major retail outlets can suddenly go direct You're talking about people who don't realize that Call of Duty is made by two alternating developers, that Bethesda didn't make New Vegas, that Sony doesn't make Final Fantasy. That is NOT money that is even remotely close to being available through direct channels and to pretend it is would be ridiculous. There is not a single game which, selling only direct through the developer, was able to make $20 million in a single month(or even two). Prove me wrong. THAT is the money that could feasibly *pretend* to be available for a Kickstarter without sounding ludicrous. I really don't understand why it's so emotionally important for you to prove that it's impossible for crowdfunding to be as successful as publisher funding. To me it seems pretty obvious that something like that cannot be proven (in other words, only time will tell) and, hence, to claim something like that is foolish. You want me to prove you wrong? I don't want to, nor do I need to. If it's really that important for you to think that it is certainly definitely 100% impossible for crowdfunding to result in business as successful as publisher funding, whatever your reason to feel that way might be, I don't want to break your spirit.

I don't see why not. Just allocate the budget you get from Kickstarter appropriately. Of course it is. Isn't that why everyone gets so excited at the chance of being able to invest in the development of an old-style kind of game?

Your words not mine. darn near impossible ≠ impossible But that is completely beside the point. There is a significant psychological difference between buying crap a publisher invested in and investing in something yourself and having that turn out to be crap - the first will result in mild anger/annoyance, the second in pretty much not wanting to invest in that developer ever again. This does not in any way contradict the reasoning that since there are enough gamers for the publishers to be able to get back their invested 20 million dollars it is not impossible for that money to get to the developer directly, especially when you take into account what percentage of the amount of money people pay for games actually gets to the publisher. I'm not saying that's definitely going to happen one day, my point is only that it's foolish to claim that it definitely won't. It may or it may not, but it's not impossible is all I'm saying.

more difficult ≠ impossible

*searches for hug smiley* ... REALLY?!

I don't understand what you're trying to say.

How the hell is that "holding the developer hostage"? What is "hostageous" about this situation? You make good stuff -> you get more money and can make more good stuff. You make bad stuff -> you don't get more money and can't keep making bad stuff. It only seems fair to me, as opposed to the way most of the current gaming market operates where you can just keep making pretty much the same crap over and over - it's easier to persuade a bunch of people to buy your crap when it's done, but to persuade a bunch of people to invest in the crap you plan to make... that's darn near impossible (developers invest in crap because it sells, as I said - it's easier to persuade a bunch of people to buy your crap when it's done).

Maybe no one (although there will almost certainly always be people who will either not back the project and later buy the game or both back it and buy it, as I know some PE backers have expressed the desire to), but so what? Then you do another Kickstarter for your next game. I don't see the issue, except that if you don't make good games people won't back your next project. It's the best way of direct content quality control by the consumers themselves.

It doesn't at the moment. Maybe no one (although there will almost certainly always be people who will either not back the project and later buy the game or both back it and buy it, as I know some PE backers have expressed the desire to), but so what? Then you do another Kickstarter for your next game. I don't see the issue, except that if you don't make good games people won't back your next project. It's the best way of direct content quality control by the consumers themselves.

This has been my point all along. To think that it is certain that it will never be possible to reach higher budget goals with crowdfunding is simply foolish.

The only thing I don't understand is why, along with cutting out the publishers, not cut out the distributors (Steam, GOG etc.) as well? No, you don't need a supergigawesome server, all you need is torrent and a private tracker - when a person pays for the game they get a unique key with which to connect to the tracker. And you're done - your customers are their own distributors (after you initially seed the game). What, that's easy to pirate? Yes, it is. So what? Everything is easy to pirate. If your game is DRM-free anyway this is only the next logical step to cut out the needless waste of budget of paying the distributors.

Ok.

No, I'm not. I'm not presuming anything at all about the two groups. I'm just saying that the fact that these people obviously have the money required for the publishers to get back their invested 20+ million dollars, it is POSSIBLE for that money to get from these people to the game developer directly. That is perfectly sound logical reasoning. The only problem here is that your perception of the term "possible" is loaded with more meaning than that term actually possesses. "Possible" only means "not impossible" (duh), nothing more and nothing less. I've already explained that and I don't see further arguments about it going anywhere.

You needed to donate 8$ on top of your tier + whatever you additionally donated for any addons.

This, too. After the games start getting released and people start (hopefully) realising that "holy s**t, these games are awesome!", then crowdfunding will really be in bloom.

My point still stands. Them getting 20+ millions of dollars from sales proves that it's far from impossible to achieve the same amount of budget through crowdfunding. No, it doesn't. It doesn't even come close to even implying that, let alone proving it. It proves that the gamers have the ability to give that amount of money. As a direct logical consequence, it is possible for them to give that amount of money directly to the developer. You seem to have difficulties grasping the meaning of "possible". It does not imply "easy" or "simple" or "it will happen tomorrow", just pure "possible" - nothing more, nothing less.

My point still stands. Them getting 20+ millions of dollars from sales proves that it's far from impossible to achieve the same amount of budget through crowdfunding. All it takes is for Kickstarter and crowdfunding in general to become more popular and for the awareness about it and its advantages to spread even more. Besides, buying a game after it's released is also always a certain leap of faith - you cannot (legally) "give the game a test ride" before you buy it. No, demos don't count - you have no idea what sort of crap might be cut out in the demo and what the material not present in it is like.