This game is already a revolution

[GrayAngel]

I say this Bioware is dead for those that dont know Ray, Greg and Drew are gone EA suck all they have and thrown them away. That whey i'm so pleased that PE is created without some stupid corporation that would suck all that the game have good and change is to some ****(DA2). So go get them Obsidian i can't wait to see more about PE.

[Merin]

This is a little bit like book publishing, which is currently trying to manage the digital Tsunami that hit music almost ten years ago.

 

As technology develops I think there will be a middle tier of gaming, kind of 'Indie Plus' studios that manage to consistently produce smaller but profitable titles direct to the customer without the publisher.

 

However... in writing, a really ,really good Amazon / digital sales rating will likely get you snapped up by a publisher. For a writer that is still a big draw for the obvious reasons: marketing and distribution. Physical sales are still very important in books as they are in games.

 

This will change, as it has in music. It will be interesting to see how the publishers play it, if they have any sense they will create proper, more autonomous sub-divisions and try to hoover up the Indie Plus guys (this happens in book publishing).

 

Well, speaking as an indie author, I'd be extremely wary of any publishing deal. It would have to be for one project, leaving me more rights than the publisher is probably willing to leave me, and then I'd consider it. Anything more restrictive than that (them getting all the rights to the property, me being contractually obligated to write more for them, etc.) and it's a no go.

 

I'm happy with Amazon and CreateSpace.

[Tale]

I thought book author tended to keep the property rights nowadays, unless its some sort of shared universe (Star Wars, Forgotten Realms). Though being contracted for several titles also sounds familiar.

 

I wish games developers could get that kind of leverage. But they need whole heck lots more capital backing them up.

[Malcador]

This isn't about the gameplay. It's about breaking away from the publisher model successfully and the slew of possibilities that opens up.

 

Then it's not even a revolution, as it's been done before.

[Merin]

I thought book author tended to keep the property rights nowadays, unless its some sort of shared universe (Star Wars, Forgotten Realms). Though being contracted for several titles also sounds familiar.

 

I wish games developers could get that kind of leverage. But they need whole heck lots more capital backing them up.

 

Well, there's the big case of the Vampire Diaries author who, after a couple decades of writing the books, got sacked by her publisher who kept the rights to the property.

 

http://thewertzone.blogspot.com/2011/02/vampire-diaries-author-fired.html

 

And you have anyone not savvy enough to realize that "work-for-hire" means that you don't own anything you create.

 

Even outside of that, you have publishers dictating to authors that they have to include or delete stuff, that they have to go on book tours, and so on.

 

I'd rather not have the extra publicity and marketing and instead have more control over my work and my life.

[Grimlorn]

These kickstarter games have to be successful and well received for it to be a revolution. Even though developers didn't pay to develop the projects, they still have to make money to fund better projects. If the games aren't well received then no revolution and it goes back to business as usual with publishers.

 

I've seen quite a few kickstarter projects that I doubt will be good. Just hope that doesn't sour people to kickstarter before W2 and Eternity are out.

Edited September 20, 2012 by Grimlorn

[KenThomas]

This isn't about the gameplay. It's about breaking away from the publisher model successfully and the slew of possibilities that opens up.

 

Then it's not even a revolution, as it's been done before.

 

You're still not getting my point. As i said in an earlier post, the emphasis is on the fact that Obsidian is a well known and respected big game developer. They're the first really well known game studio to go this route and when other companies are thinking about using kickstarter instead of a publisher, THIS is the example they're going to give. Not the ones that came before. Try to diminish this all you like, but it's a fact that this project is the one that has gotten everyone's attention, this is the one that's going to be watched closely by other devs and publishers though its development process, and this is going to be the example that's looked at historically for better or worse.

[Malcador]

How does this differ from Double Fine (didn't Schafer start the fire for KS?) or InXile or to a lesser extent Revolution or Jensen (in terms of dollars pulled in, anyway)? It's good to see but not exactly the dawn of a new age or something.

 

Just find this a bit too over dramatic, heh.

[chrisrobin]

I think it's important to realize that while we obviously have some input into the game as far as suggestions, Obsidian has a vision for what they want to do with the game and we can't, and really shouldn't, expect them to change anything based on a popular opinion in their forums.

 

I just fear a lot of people think everything about this game is up for debate and will be upset when the end result is nothing like what they suggested.

[Gurkog]

Obsidian is treading a lot closer to a game style that is in direct competition with current AAA titles. Point-and-click adventure and western turn-based RPG games were all but extinct, but there are still real-time-with-pause RPGs with an emphasis on parties being made as AAA titles.

[KenThomas]

How does this differ from Double Fine (didn't Schafer start the fire for KS?) or InXile or to a lesser extent Revolution or Jensen (in terms of dollars pulled in, anyway)? It's good to see but not exactly the dawn of a new age or something.

 

Just find this a bit too over dramatic, heh.

 

Obsidian is more well known than those examples. The project they're making is also more ambitious. Until now kickstarter has been viewed as a funding concept for "indie" games. This could be the tipping point for it becoming common practice for funding mainstream ones.

Edited September 20, 2012 by KenThomas

[Malcador]

Obsidian is more well known than those examples. The project they're making is also more ambitious. Until now kickstarter has been viewed as a funding concept for "indie" games. This could be the tipping point for it becoming common practice for funding mainstream ones.

 

More well known ? Maybe, but seems they're well known for wrong reasons around the 'net and whether or not it's ambitious, well who knows, they're all a relatively big gamble. I'm not too hopeful on Kickstarter becoming the way mainstream games get funded, given they have publishers and the overall nature of KS.

[KenThomas]

I don't think the people who have pledged to this kickstarter are part of that "wrong reasons" crowd. Almost all of the discussion I've seen are from people who respect this game developer. Many people consider Obsidian to be the most creative of the dev companies. That's the stance I take. As for the things that they've been bashed for, ie games released with bugs, who knows where the fault for that lies in the dev/publisher relationship? EA for example became known for releasing buggy names no matter who they had developing them because they forced games out before they were ready. On this project all the accountability will come down to Obsidian and it'll be interesting to see what the finished product will be like.

[Sylvius the Mad]

 

Obsidian and Project Eternity are not the start of a revolution, but one more symptom of an already ongoing one.

"The revolution will be livestreamed."