What could have been done better.

[Loranc]

For project shaker, if I'm getting this right you have to donate 15 dollars to even get access to their forums, what's up with that?

[Benison]

Overall, Obsidian delivered a great campaign. Lots of updates, some concept art, music samples (the dirge is very good), Interviews, streams, reddit AMAs.

And a screenshot. Oh, I like that screenshot!

 

What did not went that well was that the planned health/stamina sytem was not outlined in some detail at the first opportunity (I am comfy with it, it has worked just fine in PnP RPGs like Midgard for more than 30 years, it will work in P:E, too).

 

And the second thing that irked me was the late/last minute inclusion of the 4Mil stretch goal. Live instrumentation is a big, huge deal, and it really should have been anounced at least half a day sooner.

[Shiroco]

They could have (dunno if possible) altered the pitch video to incorporate additional info like the FB likes for the Dungeon. Many people just liked the kickstarter campaign and probably thought they did what was asked of them to help increase the dungeon.

 

They did alter the pitch video towards the end and included the new concept arts even.

 

My bad. I just watched the pitch video again and i hope that this and all other videos (highlights of the launch party, obsidian folks playing d&d, MCA playing arcanum, updates) will be on the dvd in addition to the whole making of Project Eternity. I think that all those things are vital to the whole PE eperience and they'll be a great memento for at least me ;D

 

Sorry for being off topic.

Edited October 18, 2012 by Shiroco

[Pshaw]

I've got to disagree. I've done a few other kickstarters before and this one was by far the best handled out of any of them. The updates were coming frequently to let us know what was happening in the planning stages and with the kickstarter itself and I greatly appreciated that. More than that though they were constantly changing things up (in terms of ways to dontate) and out getting publicity to generate more donations.

 

The team was out doing at least 1 Q&A week for almost the entire process. I loved when I'd see one pop up on gametrailers or kotaku knowing that it would bring another handful of people to the kickstarter. The idea to let the endless paths dungeon grow through facebook was also a great idea as it was a way to drum up buzz without it costing anybody a dime. Then hopefully it would spread as friends shared and liked posts through facebook. All the add-ons they gave out to get more funding between tiers was numerous and varied. I know that if I had the money to spend I would have grabbed a few of those extras in a heartbeat. Certainly I felt spoiled for choice even if I couldn't afford any of it.

 

Now in the only thing I could say is that I wish they had done a bit more planning before presenting the idea to kickstarter. I know that when I saw 'new class and companion' unlocks I was assuming a higher base amount of classes and companions than they were. I still would have donated day 1 but I was a bit let down when they unveiled the total number of classes and companions as I thought the base amount for both would have been 2 higher than it was. Still I think they ran a tremendous campaign which is why they've ended up being the 3rd most funded kickstarter to date.

Edited October 18, 2012 by Pshaw

[Loranc]

I've got to disagree. I've done a few other kickstarters before and this one was by far the best handled out of any of them. The updates were coming frequently to let us know what was happening in the planning stages and with the kickstarter itself and I greatly appreciated that. More than that though they were constantly changing things up (in terms of ways to dontate) and out getting publicity to generate more donations.

 

The team was out doing at least 1 Q&A week for almost the entire process. I loved when I'd see one pop up on gametrailers or kotaku knowing that it would bring another handful of people to the kickstarter. The idea to let the endless paths dungeon grow through facebook was also a great idea as it was a way to drum up buzz without it costing anybody a dime. Then hopefully it would spread as friends shared and liked posts through facebook. All the add-ons they gave out to get more funding between tiers was numerous and varied. I know that if I had the money to spend I would have grabbed a few of those extras in a heartbeat. Certainly I felt spoiled for choice even if I couldn't afford any of it.

 

Now in the only thing I could say is that I wish they had done a bit more planning before presenting the idea to kickstarter. I know that when I saw 'new class and companion' unlocks I was assuming a higher base amount of classes and companions than they were. I still would have donated day 1 but I was a bit let down when they unveiled the total number of classes and companions as I thought the base amount for both would have been 2 higher than it was. Still I think they ran a tremendous campaign which is why they've ended up being the 3rd most funded kickstarter to date.

 

3rd? I thought they were second, after that Ouya thingy.

[Benison]

^thought so, too. But there was this hipster watch dingus that made 10 mil. It does something smartphonish....

[Loranc]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2FdaCxMcw_Y

 

What the hell.

 

Edited October 18, 2012 by Loranc

[Monte Carlo]

They made over four million dollars, they kept us updated, they engaged with us when we were unhappy, they were patient, they got drunk on a webcam.

 

They did pretty bloody good, I am happy for them.

 

So no Monday morning quarter-backing from this callsign and my best wishes to the team.

[Leferd]

Monday morning quarter-backing? Spoken like a true Brit!

[deamon451]

I perfer armchair quarterbacking. Just as good, but I don't have to stand

[Takamori]

No boxed 65 dolar option like in wasteland 2 kickstarter >:

[Kai]

I'd say overall they did well, the communication with us fans was really great, and I think that helped upping a few pledges. Same with the add-ons, even it can be fairly confusing with all the add-ons, letting us choose some additional things that weren't included in our selected tier was pretty sweet and a good way of increasing pledges overall.

 

As for things to do better, preparations before the live streams could've been better, like the sound in the dnd stream. Won't complain about Adam's IWD installation as I found it quite amusing, plus he had a ton of other stuff to do and played on a Saturday when he could've been home sleeping.

 

About the Shaker RPG: starting a KS for a CRPG as P:E was half way done was a really bad idea. First, P:E have gotten most of the attention, Shaker seem to have been drowned from the noise P:E have made. Secondly, a lot us who pledged to P:E maxed out our pledges, meaning that even if we'd like to get in on Shaker, we don't have the funds currently. Running the KS a few weeka from now would've been a lot better, as most of us would've gotten a new paycheck, and there's not competition from P:E, in fact the attention P:E got might have been a good thing for Shaker compared to now. At least that's how I view that project.

[Monte Carlo]

Monday morning quarter-backing? Spoken like a true Brit!

 

I blame my time living it up in La Jolla for several months in the (very) early nineties.

[Regenshire]

About the Shaker RPG: starting a KS for a CRPG as P:E was half way done was a really bad idea. First, P:E have gotten most of the attention, Shaker seem to have been drowned from the noise P:E have made. Secondly, a lot us who pledged to P:E maxed out our pledges, meaning that even if we'd like to get in on Shaker, we don't have the funds currently. Running the KS a few weeka from now would've been a lot better, as most of us would've gotten a new paycheck, and there's not competition from P:E, in fact the attention P:E got might have been a good thing for Shaker compared to now. At least that's how I view that project.

 

I don't want to turn this into what has Shaker done wrong thread, but I think they made a lot of other mistakes other then starting this midstream on P:E, though I think that one is a really big one. Am I the only one who felt like they saw the P:E kickstarter and then decided to their own "Old School" RPG one, but older school? Thats probably not fair, it likely was just councidence, but when they initially released it they didn't give any details on the game itself other then it would be old old old school. And I am not sure that RPGs older then around the Infinity Engine are going to get a huge following. I remember kind of enjoying real old school RPGs like Bard's Tale, but that is in context to what games existed at that time. I don't think that really old school design has any real advantages over existing RPG design, and especially not over isometric designs.

 

Also the name on the kickstarter was originally 'Old School RPG', which, I personally think was a really bad name for a kickstarter. And can someone explain the character portrait of the guy in the Shaker shirt? I thought it was supposed to be a Fantasy RPG?

 

*Sorry to derail the thread*

[Malkaven]

A statement and not a question. Not trying to start a debate or argument, I'd simply like people's thoughts on this topic so that perchance the developers will see it and get a better idea of things that could have been better. After the excitement wore off, I started thinking to myself, there were a few things that had issues.

 

With it being in the stages of being developed, and Obsidian trying their best to get as much information out as possible, I found that there were a lot of tug/pull with their answers. One developer would say something and then a day later he would say something contradictory to what he had said before. I felt this could have been handled better, because with all the jumping around on answers it makes it very difficult to get a 'feel' for what the game will ultimately be. Keeping in mind that we'll know within the next couple months, more of what the game will be like.

 

I get the feeling that this was sort of a last ditch effort to try and save a dying genre of games, and I am thankful for the hail marry, I strongly believe that this game will be everything and more when it finally releases. Barring that in mind, I'm sure i'm not the only one with nit picks about how the Kick Starter was handled, and I'm sure a lot of us look at that 4,000,000 and think 'Damn that could have been 5 or 6 hell maybe even 7, if it had been done better.'

 

Just to give the guys/gals over at Obsidian an idea of things that you thought were done poorly, as well as things you thought that were done extremely well. This way they can read positive criticism and be more thorough with their next big project. Which had better be PE2 .

 

As a side note, something I thought that was done extremely well was the last couple of goals. The stronghold and the big big city were probably the two biggest key factors in my overly abundant donation towards the game. Without these two factors I probably would have only pledged 58 dollars (8 for the title), however with them being added in I increased 5x my donation to 288 dollars, which is a pretty significant increase based on those two stretch goals.

 

Once again I'd like to state that this isn't a thread for flaming, I'd prefer not to see any at all actually. Just your criticism on the whole process from the start to the end. Whether it was the Ustreams, Q&A's, tier incentives, stretch goals, mega dungeon, specific answers they gave, things of that nature. No griping allowed here! Only criticism please.

 

I think a wiki of what was fact according to the devs would have been nice. Information/updates seemed to be all over the place and if it wasn't on kickstarter I was typically out of the loop. Overall all though they released an update everyday and it was by far the best kickstarter I've been part of.

[Kai]

About the Shaker RPG: starting a KS for a CRPG as P:E was half way done was a really bad idea. First, P:E have gotten most of the attention, Shaker seem to have been drowned from the noise P:E have made. Secondly, a lot us who pledged to P:E maxed out our pledges, meaning that even if we'd like to get in on Shaker, we don't have the funds currently. Running the KS a few weeka from now would've been a lot better, as most of us would've gotten a new paycheck, and there's not competition from P:E, in fact the attention P:E got might have been a good thing for Shaker compared to now. At least that's how I view that project.

 

I don't want to turn this into what has Shaker done wrong thread, but I think they made a lot of other mistakes other then starting this midstream on P:E, though I think that one is a really big one. Am I the only one who felt like they saw the P:E kickstarter and then decided to their own "Old School" RPG one, but older school? Thats probably not fair, it likely was just councidence, but when they initially released it they didn't give any details on the game itself other then it would be old old old school. And I am not sure that RPGs older then around the Infinity Engine are going to get a huge following. I remember kind of enjoying real old school RPGs like Bard's Tale, but that is in context to what games existed at that time. I don't think that really old school design has any real advantages over existing RPG design, and especially not over isometric designs.

 

Also the name on the kickstarter was originally 'Old School RPG', which, I personally think was a really bad name for a kickstarter. And can someone explain the character portrait of the guy in the Shaker shirt? I thought it was supposed to be a Fantasy RPG?

 

*Sorry to derail the thread*

 

Actually, comparing Shaker to P:E is a good way of seeing what Obsidian did right. The entire "who are we" on the P:E KS is really well done, as it shows what they've achieved in the past (all of the titles pictured are CRPGs in various settings), and how those earlier games are relevant for the vision of P:E. For me, that section alone made me want to pledge. They've also referred to those titles constantly throughout the KS which for those of us who've played the earlier games, gave us great reference points to understand what they talked about. It's kinda like "this is what we've done before, imagine what we can do with even more freedom". Which meant that the fact that there wasn't a lot of lore, let alone a real title for the game when the KS started, was less of a hindrance that it would've been for another company. Play on your sntrenghts to cover your weaknesses.

 

Shaker on the other hand doesn't have the same luxury as Obsidian when it comes to earlier titles (while Doom is an awesome game, it's not something I care about in the context of a CRPG), which means that the same kind of vagueness is a significantly bigger problem for them.

[Oerwinde]

I didn't really have any issues with the kickstarter. Most of the confusion and questions people had I found was from not really paying attention or bad reading comprehension. I got the add on concept from the first update that mentioned them. Didn't understand why it took some people detailed step by step pictures.

 

The only questionable decision I thought was offering the expansion as an add on. Sure it made money for the Kickstarter, but doesn't it greatly limit what kind of money they'll make on it?

[Hassat Hunter]

Won't complain about Adam's IWD installation as I found it quite amusing, plus he had a ton of other stuff to do and played on a Saturday when he could've been home sleeping.

Indeed it was. Aren't complaining... but since this *is* a thread about 'what can be done better next time'...

[lordgizka]

I think the reason Shaker isn't getting pledges is not because the target audience is out of money, but because nowhere there is a simple reference to what the game is supposed to be a successor of (or a "clone", whatever). It's certainly not "like" Anachronox from a gameplay perspective, Hall's only actual RPG game. As I understand it, it's going to be Betrayal at Krondor/Might and Magic clone? If so, why not detail the gameplay and drop such names?

[Karkarov]

Uh they did nothing wrong and I would be mildly surprised if large parts of it were not planned well in advance. Could they have done better? Of course, there is always something else you could have done. A new reward tier, additional screenshots, more lore about the game itself, interviews with more staff, blah blah. But in the end they broke the kickstarter record as far as I know, blew their initial goal out of the water, and did a great job every single step of the way. They came out with daily updates, tons of info, and constant video's and livestreams.

 

However, no, it didn't matter what else they could have done. They were not going to get 5 or 6 or 7 million. I am surprised they got to 4. They did the best they could and as a person who has already backed 5+ other kickstarters and read about/watched over 50 I can say they also ran the best KS campaign I have seen to date by a long shot. They did better than any sane person would have expected them to, so I don't I don't really feel like there was room for too much improvement.

 

Lastly when the next game comes out I hope kickstarter is completely ignored because this game made enough money and sold enough copies that an actual publisher is willing to fund the sequel. That would be a far better sign for the genre than them needing to go back to kickstarter.

 

The only questionable decision I thought was offering the expansion as an add on. Sure it made money for the Kickstarter, but doesn't it greatly limit what kind of money they'll make on it?

Only if they were going to retail it for more than 20.

Edited October 19, 2012 by Karkarov

[Regenshire]

Lastly when the next game comes out I hope kickstarter is completely ignored because this game made enough money and sold enough copies that an actual publisher is willing to fund the sequel. That would be a far better sign for the genre than them needing to go back to kickstarter.

 

My hope is that after this game is released they will realize enough profit to fund their next game internally and be able to self publish, leaving the large publishers completely out of the equation.

[Hormalakh]

I thought it went really well. This was my first KS. The only thing I would say is that next time, the should have stretch goals planned out even for budgets they don't think they'll hit. Obsidian is a very well loved company and I wasn't surprised that they hit $3 or $4 mil at the end. People have been playing their games and loving them for a long while - something a lot of the other KS companies didn't have was name recognition.

[Jojobobo]

I think they did well, and I highly doubt they could have raised more than what they did. If they gave contradictory information it's because this is a new IP so it's hard to give definite answers when it's so early in development. If the crowdfund a sequel I'd imagine they will raise more money (because the release of the first game will create a fanbase) and they'd be able to give more finite answers from the off as the lore will be established, but I don't think they could have done any better with PE.

[Hassat Hunter]

Lastly when the next game comes out I hope kickstarter is completely ignored because this game made enough money and sold enough copies that an actual publisher is willing to fund the sequel. That would be a far better sign for the genre than them needing to go back to kickstarter.

Finally breaking free of publishers only to immediately sign with the devil afterwards?

 

Sounds like a worst-case-scenario to me...

[Karkarov]

Lastly when the next game comes out I hope kickstarter is completely ignored because this game made enough money and sold enough copies that an actual publisher is willing to fund the sequel. That would be a far better sign for the genre than them needing to go back to kickstarter.

Finally breaking free of publishers only to immediately sign with the devil afterwards?

 

Sounds like a worst-case-scenario to me...

A publisher getting involved is a clear sign that the game was a big financial success, so big it can't be ignored. That is a good sign for the genre and it's long term viability, not to mention Obsidian's fiscal future. Them coming back to kickstarter is not. Self publishing is more expensive and time consuming than what many posters seem to think it is.