How to make a sucsessful crowdfounding company?

[Mutated bycicle-mage]

Several months ago i was asking about finding a translators for my role-playing game. I found one, and now it's tested and ready to be released. Only barrier that left - is steam greenlight enetring fee, that is 100$, and i decided that crowdfounding sites can help me, but... there is almost a week passed since i started the champaign, but still got not a single donation. I realize that i am not a famous developer, and my game is not an aaa-title, but i am not asking for millions either, only 100$. Maybe problem is that my game will be free to play for anyone, and people just don't want to spent even a dollar to help the game that will be free anyway? Or people just tired of indie games, and story-based games, so there is not a single gamer in the world who would help me? That is all possibilities that are coming to my mind, but maybe i am missing something? Can you advice me, please?

[Gizmo]

If I had to guess... and I could be wrong... It might be that the entrance fee is $100 [not $1500, not $2500]; and (in the opinion of others ~perhaps) what are the odds that it is a serious developer ~ one with the drive to actually see the project through to completion... when they apparently need [to essentially beg for] $100 or fail to start their project?

 

*(Even though the perception may not be the reality.)

 

** I've seen homeless pan-handlers that make more than $100 a day; because they treat it as a daily job [unfortunately]. The reason I mention this is simply that with drive and determination, one can usually succeed... and that a mere $100 [mere to some] probably seems like a small hurdle [and might seemingly imply a lack of determination of the developer] to those you would ask to crowd fund the project.

 

**The flipside:  [Perception] Anyone who cannot get $100 from their family [lump or in parts] to start their dream project, might seem a tad doubtful to complete strangers on the Internet; as well they may find it odd as hell that one's friends & family did not bid the first few hundred for the campaign.   

Edited June 26, 2016 by Gizmo

[Mutated bycicle-mage]

But the main difference between me and other crowdfounding projects is that my game is already finished, and that's why i need money only to release it...

And only family i have is my mother. She retired, and goverment pays her pension that is not much above my month income - around 100$ per month, and she already helping me, so i would never ask so much money from her because it will mean leaving her hungry only to fufill my dreams... We are not getting along well and rarely speaking, but still i will never do something like that to her, even that i am sure that she would try to help me - and exacly because of that i am not asking.

 

But yeah, i kind get your point. I even had the same issues where people from the capital or borderline countries refused to trust me because things are twice more expencive where they live, and they earn twice more. And people in countries with dollars and euro as a currency can earn 10x times more in month. Quess, for some people the world ends where their town border ends, and the rest of the planet is just a fairytale, they can read about it, but never actually believe in all those stories.

 

But then... how can this problem be solved? I can answer any questions but nobody asks any. I write quite detailed story about why exacly things are as they are, and i can write twice bigger story - but i hear that people don't like walls of text, so i am trying to keep it as short as i can. What esle can i do? I could ask for more money, to look less unusual to them, but first - i have no need for that much, and second - that would require me to lie, so that is not an option.

[Gizmo]

But then... how can this problem be solved? I can answer any questions but nobody asks any. I write quite detailed story about why exacly things are as they are, and i can write twice bigger story - but i hear that people don't like walls of text, so i am trying to keep it as short as i can. What esle can i do?

Self Promotion (first and foremost)... Do you have your demo video on Youtube? [with a link to the funding page].

Also: Patreon... GoG...

https://www.gog.com/indie

https://www.patreon.com/

Edited June 26, 2016 by Gizmo

[Mutated bycicle-mage]

I am not sure what to include in the demo video. Game is made of talking and some fighting... You will gain nothing from watching part of story cut out of context.

 

Can i publish for free on that websites?

[Gizmo]

Youtube is free. You can tag your video with relevant associative words, and it will come up in user searches where it's a match. You can post the link yourself to any forums you are part of [where relevent]; or even put the link in your SiG. (I have three in mine.) 

 

 GoG will [may] sell the game for you [both].

Edited June 27, 2016 by Gizmo

[saxmaam]

Several months ago i was asking about finding a translators for my role-playing game. I found one, and now it's tested and ready to be released. Only barrier that left - is steam greenlight enetring fee, that is 100$, and i decided that crowdfounding sites can help me, but... there is almost a week passed since i started the champaign, but still got not a single donation. I realize that i am not a famous developer, and my game is not an aaa-title, but i am not asking for millions either, only 100$. Maybe problem is that my game will be free to play for anyone, and people just don't want to spent even a dollar to help the game that will be free anyway? Or people just tired of indie games, and story-based games, so there is not a single gamer in the world who would help me? That is all possibilities that are coming to my mind, but maybe i am missing something? Can you advice me, please?

Why not post link to your kickstarter campaign here?

[Gizmo]

 Why not post link to your kickstarter campaign here?

 

Wouldn't that be spamming a commercial game company's web forum with a competing product?

 

*There is another game forum that I frequent a lot, and it has always astounded me that indy game developers will not only show up there to announce their own games for sale on that company's own commercial game forums ~made for their games, (doing so because of a deliberate  product similarity),  but also that they seem to have no concept (or concern) that this is abusive/exploitive imposition on their part, building upon another's work (to bring and keep an audience), and trying to sell that audience; something that I'd think should embarrass them greatly; but it doesn't. 

 

** I know that I'd be livid if I had built a large forum community around a game/or company that I had designed, and then have people posting spam for their games on my server (that I'd be paying for)...

 

This is something that I would feel uncomfortable doing, even if encouraged by the forum owner, and with their full permission.

Edited July 9, 2016 by Gizmo

[Mutated bycicle-mage]

Yeah, i felt exacly the same. Thanks for all the tips - i finaly did it, and now my game entered the greenlight and already collected 6% of the votes needed!)