Is project eternity the best managed kickstarter game?

[Nirgal]

Broken age is massively overbudget, Wastelands 2 has very few updates and doesn't look that good, Planetary anihilation has had the beta controversy, shadowrun returns is delayed (but overall doing well to be fair

 

Project eternity looks great in comparison: Great lookign screenshots, Regular updates, constant interviews and direct communication, tranparent development and they are apparently staying within budget.

 

 

[Sensuki]

Technically they are behind schedule (not necessarily a bad thing, because they've been conservative with their team size) but I would say they are up there.

[keysersoze]

And thankfully they are not spamming like Star Citizen

[Sensuki]

Yeah I know my god, I have unsubscribed myself from their updates.

[Labadal]

Wasteland 2 seems to be very well managed, but I can't say what goes on behind closed doors.

[Infinitron]

Yes, Wasteland 2 seems to be the best-managed Kickstarter RPG, but inXile has a relatively secretive approach to things which definitely helps with public perception.

 

I do know for sure that they've acquired several additional sources of funding besides the Kickstarter funds since development on the game began.

Edited July 3, 2013 by Infinitron

[rjshae]

Shadowrun Returns is set for release this month. If they come out on budget then I'd say they're probably a candidate.

[Infinitron]

Shadowrun Returns is set for release this month. If they come out on budget then I'd say they're probably a candidate.

 

Definitely not. They've taken so many things out of the game that it's obvious it was mismanaged. No stealth, no ammunition, no saving or loading(!!!)

[Sensuki]

Shadowrun Returns definite bungle. I am gearing myself up for disappointment with that one.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

PE is one of the better funded Kickstarter games, so I would wager that it is probably not in very much danger of being bungled.

[motorizer]

Elite dangerous seems to be pretty good with the newsletters and stuff, the initial campaign was a bit of a balls up though and I reckon they could have got a lot more money with better planning, but I love the direction they are taking.

Forsaken fortress is a bit sparse with the updates, but when we do get one, it looks like a much better game now than the one I initially pledged for, looks like they are putting the money to good use

The new satellite reign one looks good so far, but only a few days in though

 

P:E or elite dangerous may be the best ones for updates that I've backed, I get a lot more from star citizen than either of them but to be honest I've stopped reading them, you can overdo it....(though it may be because I'm a little less excited for star citizen than I am for P:E or E:D)

 

Of the 15 games I've backed, only malevolence and xenonauts have actually put out anything playable yet

Edited July 3, 2013 by motorizer

[Karkarov]

I would say eternity is easily the best.  Wasteland updates are almost non existent, and when they arrive they are normally pretty meh.  Shadowrun looks fine, I don't remember them promising the moon and stars, just a good shadowrun inspired game and that appears to be what we are getting.  They seem to have stayed in budget, and are behind schedule but not dangerously so.

[Diagoras]

Project Eternity, Wasteland 2, FTL, Maia, War for the Overworld, Castle Story, Dead State, Grim Dawn, and Guns of Icarus Online are all pretty well-managed, though with incredibly different attitudes towards feedback (ie. contrast Dead State's confident lack of communication with War for the Overworld's enthusiastic and weekly updates). Guns of Icarus is interesting, thanks to its successful second Kickstarter being similar to a second round of public financing and showing that crowdfunding can do what investment funding can and provide additional backing for a good vision.

 

The exceptions are what I'm really interested in, and each of them is fascinating in its own way:

 

I'm looking forward to seeing the outcome of the Double Fine Adventure's attempt to go for second-round financing/early sale with the first half of the game - as it will show the level of financial flexibility available in this model. Their decision to be almost totally honest with their problems is refreshing, and I hope they don't end up being punished for it.

 

The head of Shadowrun Returns had to make some tough decisions but went ahead and made them, and it'll be interesting to see the backer response once the game releases - are they happy he did what he could to deliver, or upset that his early estimates were off? The Microsoft DRM issue sucks, and the dead hand of publishers reaching into crowdfunding leaves a bitter taste in many backer's mouths that has earned Harebrained Schemes some goodwill - as well as their clear love for their own game.

 

The Banner Saga's issues with their free-to-play combat testing shows both the importance of communication as well as that the wisdom of crowds is opposed by the unique stupidity of crowds. People heard "free-to-play" and, because they have no actual idea what it means, panicked in a way that feels curiously like investor panic. This wasn't helped by generally ignorant backers who hadn't read any of the updates and weren't going to let that get in the way of their shouting. The issue was resolved by clarifications from the developers and other backers shouting down the ignorant, but it shows the dangers of these larger project's substantial number of unengaged backers who treat Kickstarter like a store. Hopefully, incidents like these will either teach them or shake them out of the ecosystem.

 

The death of Haunts: The Manse Macabre was undignified, but the backers were extremely gracious. That bodes well for small Kickstarter projects, as they appear to be able to generate the intimacy and sense of community that crowdfunding excels at providing.

[Elerond]

22can's Godus project has quite good weekly updates and they are on alpha stage already, which looks nice.

 

Say what you say about Peter Molyneux, but it seems that he has quite good handle how to keep product in the budget and the time.

 

But PE has most interesting updates for me and Godus comes as second and then Planetary Annihilation and Elite Dangerous.

 

In my understanding why inXile don't make regular updates is that they don't have capacity to free people to do them, which is bit sad for me as I am very interested to know how they produce games compared to other companies that I have backed.

 

And what comes to ready kickstarter project there is already several that I have backed, but only one game (Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams), but several games are already in alpha stages. And it looks that end of this year I will have least half dozen games to play.

[motorizer]

I'm a wee bit concerned about double fines inability to stick to a budget, as though I didn't back broken age, I did back massive chalice....to be honest on the strength of their good name and the basic Idea, as they had almost nothing to show us. so I hope all turns out well.

 

It does make me a bit wary of pledging more than the minimum to get a copy, as it is a risk (I've pledged at or slightly above the minimum to get the game on all but elite dangerous, where I was swayed by free future expansions)

Edited July 3, 2013 by motorizer

[decado]

I would say that Wasteland is very well managed.  I don't mind so much about the lack of updates.  But it's Brian Fargo for eff's sake, he's been doing it for a long time so I have to believe he knows what's up. P:E is very well managed, I would think.  No major catastrophes, etc.  

 

I think some people had their expectations a little too high, to be honest.  Kickstarting games is an experiment at this point, so patience is a virtue.  Nobody was going to get it right on the first try.   The Double Fine guys were upfront about their screw up -- they kept getting more money money, so they kept adding ****.  They got excited, and ran themselves off the cliff.  Personally, I would take a conservative approach but I'm not them.  I feel like the P:E and Wasteland guys were all reasonable in their stretch goals, but I guess we'll see.

[Tale]

Of the higher funded ones? Shadowrun Returns is about to come out, so I'm fairly optimistic about them.

 

I haven't seen any red flags on P:E yet to make me worried.

[Sacred_Path]

Between the frequent updates, forum communication and listening to feedback I'm very happy with this KS. I'm also not seeing any signs that they've been squandering.

 

Now some projects like i.e. Hero-U, that would have me worried (and it did have backers at the 10k tier)

[Bill Gates' Son]

I'm not really surprised that someone like Tim let the game go over the budget.  Two of his other big games (Brutal Legend and Psychonauts) went over budget because he becauses he keeps adding new and even newer things to his game.  I mean, he didn't even have an idea on what the game was going to be about while they were doing the kickstarter.  He's so used to making games with an AAA budget that he think about   Are people really surprised about this?

 

I personally think most other kickstarters will be fine.  Tim has just never been good at budgeting his projects because he's not really good at managing his ideas.

[Diagoras]

As I clarified in another thread - DoubleFine has not run out of money. They have revised their projections and decided that, on the current track, they risk running out of money on the tail end of the game. When deciding whether to cut scope or raise additional funds, they decided to try and raise more by selling the first half on Steam early access.

[BruceVC]

As I clarified in another thread - DoubleFine has not run out of money. They have revised their projections and decided that, on the current track, they risk running out of money on the tail end of the game. When deciding whether to cut scope or raise additional funds, they decided to try and raise more by selling the first half on Steam early access.

 

 You can spin it any way you want, it still doesn't change the fact they don't  seem to understand a basic balance sheet? 

[SophosTheWise]

I'm not sure how well-managed Project Eternity is. I think it's no possible to know at this stage. Of course we have Updates every week (though they are rather small updates compared with, say, Pathfinder Online) but those updates rarely touch the process of development/marketing/whateverthehellobsidiandoes on a deeper level. What we know is that they are behind schedule and that the website for the backers is still not online even though they have announced it a few times.

 

So all in all we have really small flaws in the visible managment but we don't know what's going on behind the curtains. Though I'm absolutely optimistic because Obsidian is hell of a sympathetic company.

[rjshae]

 

Shadowrun Returns is set for release this month. If they come out on budget then I'd say they're probably a candidate.

 

Definitely not. They've taken so many things out of the game that it's obvious it was mismanaged. No stealth, no ammunition, no saving or loading(!!!)

 

Taking things out of a game does not necessarily equal mismanagement. It can be essential to keeping the game within the budget.

[marelooke]

Given the company's history I'm quite confident in Larian's management of Divnity: Original Sin's budget, more so than pretty much any other KS out there.

Edited July 3, 2013 by marelooke

[SophosTheWise]

Given the company's history I'm quite confident in Larian's management of Divnity: Original Sin's budget, more so than pretty much any other KS out there.

 

Well, even though Divinity 2 was kind of flawed and broken until the recent (?) update.