Is $4M enough?

[Veeno]

Possible in the same sense that it's possible for a Kickstarter to reach $1 trillion, as that much money exists in the world. It's not "possible" in a practical sense. People buying finished games says NOTHING AT ALL about the money available to Kickstarters for games and to say otherwise is the stuff of fairytales.

 

Ok.

[Rostere]

Still after the irritation past, I did try to think about it objectively and the thought did creep in.....is $4M really enough to deliver a Triple A gaming experience?

 

Of course not, but who cares about those anyway? If you want a triple-A game, wait for DA3 or ME5 or whatever.

[Luridis]

How about giving it a few months and seeing what's coming out of the pipeline before throwing in the towel, eh?

 

There are all kinds of costs I can see showing up in publisher funded projects that I don't see here:

• IP License (Wizards of the Coast, Lord of the Rings, Lucas Arts, etc.)
  
• Engine License & 3rd Party Software (Unity is a flat $1500 per developer seat with no maintenance or per-copy fees.)
  
• Cross-Platform Development for Consoles & Mobile Devices (Linux & Mac support is far less work as they run on the same hardware architecture.)
  
• Voice Acting (LOL @ $300M)
  
• 3D World Environment (World space needs to be designed to be seen from all viewable angles.)
  
• Multiplayer Integration
  
• Bulk Retail Packaging, Distribution & Product Placement (Obsidian can wait till they come knocking if the game becomes popular.)
  
• Fatty publisher markup and exaggeration of the costs on some of the above.
  

 

So, basically game publishers are now doing to game studios what music publishers have been doing to artists for 40 years. Cut Obsidian some slack and give them time to produce before turning into a fool of a doomsayer.

[YourVoiceisAmbrosia]

4 million isn't a particularly large budget, but I think it's sufficient to pull off what Obsidian wants to do. AAA games nowadays are getting expensive, but I think it's because budgeting is leaning more towards marketing and cinematics, both of which can take an considerable amount of funding. Marketing for PE has either generally been word-of-mouth or unpaid, and cinematics, from what I understand, will be limited, considering that Obsidian is aiming for a genre of games that is generally known for limited voice acting, little to no cut scenes, and with a much smaller emphasis on 3D modeling and graphics compared to games today. As such, while PE does not have the budget of a AAA game, in the end I don't think it really needs it either.

[sfam]

"Celebrity voice actors who cost way more than they're worth..."

 

So true! I'd love to know just how much sales are affected for the Todd Howard era Elder with the big budget actors he has to hire. So much money paid to well known actors that the average gamer couldn't care less about. As long as the acting is good and believable, that's all that matters. I just really doubt that the celebrity marquee of a videogame matters all that much as far as sales go.

Just to be contrarian, I loved me some Patrick Stuart in Oblivion. Or Sean Bean for that matter. I`d definitely pay extra for high qualityvoice acting, but i agree it doesn't have it be a big name. If it is, it better be recognizable to be worth it.

 

Annd some AAA games like Skyrim are truly stellar. I think many peoplewill like both those and games like we hope PE will be.

[C2B]

Just to be contrarian, I loved me some Patrick Stuart in Oblivion.

 

The problem with Patrick Stewart in Oblivion was that there were like 5 minutes of Patrick Stewart in Oblivion.

[Eternitude]

Of course not, but who cares about those anyway? If you want a triple-A game, wait for DA3 or ME5 or whatever.

 

How about giving it a few months and seeing what's coming out of the pipeline before throwing in the towel, eh?

 

So, basically game publishers are now doing to game studios what music publishers have been doing to artists for 40 years. Cut Obsidian some slack and give them time to produce before turning into a fool of a doomsayer.

 

Dudes, take it easy. I was more trying to convey my irritiation with so called industry "experts, analysts, insiders" hating on the crowdfunding concept more than me asking the question. I asked it more in a hypothetical conversation starting sense because I was interested in what the community forum had to say.

 

If you read my final paragraph it communicated that I was content and had confidence with what Obsidian could do with $4M with realistic expectations.

[sfam]

Just to be contrarian, I loved me some Patrick Stuart in Oblivion.

 

The problem with Patrick Stewart in Oblivion was that there were like 5 minutes of Patrick Stewart in Oblivion.

And on all the trailers. He was perfect for the role and is still memorable years later, as was Sean Bean. I see no problem there.

[AwesomeOcelot]

Just to be contrarian, I loved me some Patrick Stuart in Oblivion.

 

The problem with Patrick Stewart in Oblivion was that there were like 5 minutes of Patrick Stewart in Oblivion.

And on all the trailers. He was perfect for the role and is still memorable years later, as was Sean Bean. I see no problem there.

 

Nothing wrong with their performances but they were so short I feel the only reason they were there was so they could say these famous actors are in the game. Of course the voice acting and dialogue for the rest of the game wasn't good.

[Dangermouth]

"Businessmen" know jack, but have purses with too much money because people are dumb enough to give it to them and make silly excuses along the lines of "That's the way it is, so I must comply. Give me my iphone now because I am not a complete person without it".

 

A lot of the better businesses were created (note that word) by creative people and only started to go downhill after the corps got involved and decided to do things to 'improve' business. As someone who's done a lot of sorting out of said 'improvements' once they've failed, I demur with their view(s).

 

Let's look at good old XCOM. The supposed 'brilliant' new reimagining with a huge budget vs the re-doing on a very small budget of Xenonauts. Both have their merits (xeno is still in alpha so I can't really yet comment upon it other than to say the Alpha is actually good) but the fact that one will have cost a great deal more than the other doesn't mean that it's better, just that it cost more.

 

Ignoring the subjective, as much as you can and because you have to, the thing to ask is "Is the game any good?". If you like it, who cares what 'label' is applied to it? I take it that the vast majority of those on here are people who can to some extent think for themselves and do so from time to time just because it makes a nice change from letting someone stupid do it for you.

 

[HungryHungryOuroboros]

Of course not, but who cares about those anyway? If you want a triple-A game, wait for DA3 or ME5 or whatever.

 

How about giving it a few months and seeing what's coming out of the pipeline before throwing in the towel, eh?

 

So, basically game publishers are now doing to game studios what music publishers have been doing to artists for 40 years. Cut Obsidian some slack and give them time to produce before turning into a fool of a doomsayer.

 

Dudes, take it easy. I was more trying to convey my irritiation with so called industry "experts, analysts, insiders" hating on the crowdfunding concept more than me asking the question. I asked it more in a hypothetical conversation starting sense because I was interested in what the community forum had to say.

 

If you read my final paragraph it communicated that I was content and had confidence with what Obsidian could do with $4M with realistic expectations.

The industry experts and analysts were curbing the over-inflated journalistic reaction of "KICKSTARTER SUPER SUCCESSFUL TAKE THAT BYE BYE PUBLISHERS". The simple fact of the matter is that for mid-to-high-end budgeted video games released for major platforms, the sort of business niche that major publishers are actually interested in, Kickstarter is not a replacement nor is it set to be a replacement. A publisher looks at $4 million gained and let's say $10 million in profits and doesn't even notice it behind their tens of millions to make tens of millions budgets. Eternity is small-scale and entirely out of regular publisher notice, and the best they'll do is try and exploit the Kickstarter system for a few easy dollars(as they tried with Obsidian).

[Dangermouth]

<snip>

 

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.

 

Actually, thinking about this were the gaming community to 'wise up' (unlikely given its demographic), this would in many ways be the way to go for the games industry and perhaps other types of art in general. It allows market forces (...) to be applied naturalistically and, allowing for there to be sufficient breadth through the more esoteric niches being able to collaborate - via the www - could mean that art(istic endeavour) can be allowed to flourish without it being subject to the overview of the 'Hollywood Paradigm' (Rocky V, VI, etc).

 

It also, to an extent, empowers (ugh, trite word but there you go) those who have disposable income and inclination (so perhaps the more 'considered' customer).

[Veeno]

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.

Edited October 19, 2012 by Veeno

[Sylvius the Mad]

Did they have budgets of $20 million 10 years ago? Would those same games, with cheaper technology, have a budget of $20 million today?

 

Looking at today's AAA titles is pointless, as they bear little resemblance to Project Eternity.

[Sylvius the Mad]

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.

CCP used this distrbution method when they ended their publisher agreement with Simon & Schuster. The EVE client was downloaded and shared using bittorrent, and then CCP collected the activation and subscription fees directly from the users.

[Eternitude]

The industry experts and analysts were curbing the over-inflated journalistic reaction of "KICKSTARTER SUPER SUCCESSFUL TAKE THAT BYE BYE PUBLISHERS". The simple fact of the matter is that for mid-to-high-end budgeted video games released for major platforms, the sort of business niche that major publishers are actually interested in, Kickstarter is not a replacement nor is it set to be a replacement. A publisher looks at $4 million gained and let's say $10 million in profits and doesn't even notice it behind their tens of millions to make tens of millions budgets. Eternity is small-scale and entirely out of regular publisher notice, and the best they'll do is try and exploit the Kickstarter system for a few easy dollars(as they tried with Obsidian).

 

Your points have all been valid, thoughtful, and well communicated. However, I still believe you (along with the analysts) are undervaluing the *potential* of crowd funding, both in it's funding capacity and in it's ability to give voice to the end user. We may also be underestimating the discontent many gamers have with several publishers and the fact that they may be all too happy to bypass them. I am not saying anything is guaranteed, far from it, but I am also not going to say crowd funding is *guaranteed* to not achieve higher funding goals.

Edited October 19, 2012 by Eternitude

[Veeno]

Your points have all been valid, thoughtful, and well communicated. However, I still believe you (along with the analysts) are unvaluing the *potential* of crowd funding, both in it's funding capacity and in it's ability to give voice to the end user. We may also be underestimating the discontentment many gamers have with several publishers and the fact that they may be all too happy to bypass them. I am not saying anything is guaranteed, far from it, but I am also not going to say crowd funding is *guaranteed* to not achieve higher funding goals.

 

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.

[Hiro Protagonist II]

 

Video game budgets have increased at an incredible rate over the past decade:

 

· 1-4 mil 2000

· 5 mil in 2006

· 20m in 2010

 

 

You're a long way off. Fallout released in 1997 had a budget of 3m. BG2 would be at the very least 5m.

[C2B]

The big issue with getting more people to crowdfunding is

 

well, it's crowdfunding

 

You'll only ever get a (quite possibly) small fraction of the actual market for the game. The majority won't invest in something that

 

A: Hasn't been made yet

 

B: They don't really get anything back aside from swag.

 

That's also why I believe, successful products will be profitable in most cases.

Edited October 19, 2012 by C2B

[Kionter]

They asked for a lot less than 4M, I'm confident they have enough to do whatever they had in mind and more.

[Eternitude]

The big issue with getting more people to crowdfunding is

 

well, it's crowdfunding

 

You'll only ever get a (quite possibly) small fraction of the actual market for the game.

 

I am not prepared to stipulate this as an absolute law of nature. Who's to say for sure that the concept can't attract higher fractions of end users?

 

 

The majority won't invest in something that

 

Honestly it doesn't really need to be anywhere near the *majority* to achieve higher funding goals.

 

B: They don't really get anything back aside from swag.

 

I believe you underestimate the power of swag, sir.... Especially the ability to participate in the Alpha and Beta testing

[AwesomeOcelot]

They asked for a lot less than 4M, I'm confident they have enough to do whatever they had in mind and more.

 

Also they kept the scope of the project pretty vague, and some of the stretch goals even vaguer, so they have so much room to maneuver.

[C2B]

The big issue with getting more people to crowdfunding is

 

well, it's crowdfunding

 

You'll only ever get a (quite possibly) small fraction of the actual market for the game.

 

I am not prepared to stipulate this as an absolute law of nature. Who's to say for sure that the concept can't attract higher fractions of end users?

 

It can (I don't think the upper end has been reached quite yet). But I honestly doubt it's ever going to be a majority (Except in special cases) of the actual people interested in buying it. Buisness just doesn't work this way.

 

And that's good. A game should hopefully still make a big profit after all. If the majority is already backing, who's going to buy?

 

P:E selling well may even allow them to use their own money later, instead of needing kickstarter.

Edited October 19, 2012 by C2B

[Veeno]

Buisness just doesn't work this way.

 

It doesn't at the moment.

 

And that's good. A game should hopefully still make a big profit after all. If the majority is already backing, who's going to buy?

 

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.

[Maugrim]

I'm happy to believe that a good game can be made for $4m. My worry is that most good games made for $4m start out with a projected $3m budget...

 

Feature creep and an 'unexpectedly' (it's always unexpected, somehow) long bug fixing phase are eternal bugbears of the industry.

 

Talking of which, I don't believe this game is going to be released in 2014. I trust Obsidian to get it done, but I think 1.5 years is optimistic given all the stretch features.