Did you know? -- Kickstarters and what not!

[Carnivol]

Slow news ... quarter!

It's a slow news period, that's for sure. Some are drooling (or complaining) over the obvious existence of a new Resident Evil project at Capcom, some are counting the minutes and Facebook likes since the previous update on Team IGAS' Resident Evil 1.5 restoration project, others waiting for The Evil Within from Shinji Mikami and his new band of developers, and some are clearly eyeing other stuff going on online in the world of gaming and what not.

Kickstarter's undoubtadly become one of the biggest promises in gaming this past year or so, with countless developers promising to try their best to deliver products that fulfills all your wildest dreams, wants, wishes, and expectations -- at a price. Some even allow the expecting and excited fans to contribute with content of their own -- again, at a price.

Some kickstarters might hit closer to home than others, be it 'cause they are for projects that'd be dreams come true for you or because maybe you're somehow involved and invested yourself?

The Next Car Game kickstarter, for instance, is for extra funding for BugBear's new racing/demolition game (which is a sort of mash up of FlatOut and Destruction Derby) and one of the designers on the game is an old colleague and former roommate of yours truly. "Small world"

The recently succesfull kickstarter for the Mysterioues Cities of Gold video game caught the attention of a few of our former forum regulars whom aren't as active on the forums as they used to be, but possibly more interesting to some of you would be that the translations into some of the additional languages supported were actually provided by a few of our staff members here at THIA. (Yeah... We're working ... that's why we're always slacking on the site and boards)

So, what about you folks? Any kickstarters you're following or eager about? What would you fund on kickstarter if popped up? Maybe one of the many attempts at bringing back classic survival horror? Outbreak clones?

[LoneWolf6:16]

Infected

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=102324622

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1331682987/i-nfected-classic-survival-horror

Old-school survival horror game in the works on Steam Greenlight and Kickstarter. Long-time RE fans should be able to appreciate this.

[RetroRain]

Kickstarter is one of the best things to happen to the gaming community in years. I say "gaming community", and not "gaming industry", because the "game industry", as far as I'm concerned, is dead to me. Their greed, stupidity, all-about-graphics attitude, and not caring what fans want has really made the game industry look pathetic.

I never thought I'd see the day when former Capcom employees would start their own companies and do the things that they really wanted to do, or that actual game modders would have an impact as big as they're having, and that even a single kid on his computer could put out a game that is free, and more fun to play than the crap the big giant companies are putting out.

It's pretty sad that fans have to go to Kickstarter to get an Outbreak-type Resident Evil game because Capcom stubbornly refuses to make another one. This is why I feel the game industry is dying, and also why within the next 5-10 years, it will never be the same again. The game industry will be replaced by the gamers/fans/modders that are doing their own projects. And thank God it's happening.

[MeganGrass]

Kickstarter is one of the best things to happen to the gaming community in years. I say "gaming community", and not "gaming industry", because the "game industry", as far as I'm concerned, is dead to me. Their greed, stupidity, all-about-graphics attitude, and not caring what fans want has really made the game industry look pathetic.

I never thought I'd see the day when former Capcom employees would start their own companies and do the things that they really wanted to do, or that actual game modders would have an impact as big as they're having, and that even a single kid on his computer could put out a game that is free, and more fun to play than the crap the big giant companies are putting out.

It's pretty sad that fans have to go to Kickstarter to get an Outbreak-type Resident Evil game because Capcom stubbornly refuses to make another one. This is why I feel the game industry is dying, and also why within the next 5-10 years, it will never be the same again. The game industry will be replaced by the gamers/fans/modders that are doing their own projects. And thank God it's happening.

I agree, about 95%...

Financially speaking, the industry is far from dead. To either your or me, yeah - it's dead - only in the sense that we obviously don't care about the garbage being produced.

*insert rant about brain dead "gamers" who buy /title/ because it's the 15th entry in said series*

The game industry is BIG business, and it's all in the hands of corporate big-wigs who only care about what their financial advisors are recommending. I sincerely doubt these people are even gamers, to be perfectly honest. Long gone are the days of passionate game development (on a corporate level); it's all about the money, now.

[Carnivol]

Kickstarter is one of the best things to happen to the gaming community in years. I say "gaming community", and not "gaming industry", because the "game industry", as far as I'm concerned, is dead to me. Their greed, stupidity, all-about-graphics attitude, and not caring what fans want has really made the game industry look pathetic.

I think part of the problem with larger corporations these days is that they want less products to manage and higher sales per product, rather than many products that sell an average amount and cator to a broader userbase. Why? Well ... I get the feeling that there's a lot of excessive staff in management, people who collect bonuses and sallaries that are unjustifiably high (typical corporate stuff), and a lot of higher ups who don't really understand what it is they make/sell at the company they work for, and they all fear for their jobs and they fear change in a direction they're not familiar with (which in many cases is EVERY direction, since they're basically sailing a ship in waters they're not really familiar with at all) ... so keeping their scope limited helps them defend/justify their position in the food chain, whilst expanding from trying to cover all bases with a single product to appealing to a broader group by offering larger product variety is a frightening concept. If you're in a situation where you're simply not capable of familiarizing yourself with the product you're selling, it's easier to just have to sell "that product that we make", rather than approach the market and inquire about their needs/interests and be able to go "Well, we have a product like that in our catalog!".

I never thought I'd see the day when former Capcom employees would start their own companies and do the things that they really wanted to do, or that actual game modders would have an impact as big as they're having, and that even a single kid on his computer could put out a game that is free, and more fun to play than the crap the big giant companies are putting out.

For the last bit, I feel that's kinda always been the case, it's just that not everything's headline material (or no one bothered to make it a headline that they went from "this" to "that").

[J0shuaKane]

i think what people miss, just like with fast food or the radio/TV, is that corporations don't care. the don't care if you want quality, diversity, or the same garbage over and over again. they don't care if games make you think or not, they will sell whatever people want to buy. they are giving people what they want, and most gamers i talk to are happy with their game selection and are always excited about the new whatever-they-play.

the dreamcast was the last system i know of to take leaps and bounds with unique games and types of gameplay, all other systems since come off as militant for what kind of games they put out. and i don't blame them.

we can all sit back and speculate, but if you were the man with the money, you think you would make the more "fun" decision?

*insert rant about brain dead "gamers" who buy /title/ because it's the 15th entry in said series*

yep, people are just too stupid to think for themselves...

no wonder you are afraid of americans its ok if people think or act differently, its not crazy or "brain dead", its ok.

[Carnivol]

the dreamcast was the last system i know of to take leaps and bounds with unique games and types of gameplay, all other systems since come off as militant for what kind of games they put out. and i don't blame them.

DS and Wii systems and their respective line ups might want to grab a bit of your attention. The variety of their mad library in terms of critical and commercial succesful stuff is just mind mind blowing.

[J0shuaKane]

i loved my wii for that when it came out, but after a couple years something happened, and their only good releases were their franchise titles. i quit paying attention though, now that the nintendo library has grown i should take another look at it. you don't seem like you just throw around terms like "mind blowing"

[MeganGrass]

yep, people are just too stupid to think for themselves...

no wonder you are afraid of americans its ok if people think or act differently, its not crazy or "brain dead", its ok.

Uhmm. Okay.

I think part of the problem with larger corporations these days is that they want less products to manage and higher sales per product, rather than many products that sell an average amount and cator to a broader userbase. Why? Well ... I get the feeling that there's a lot of excessive staff in management, people who collect bonuses and sallaries that are unjustifiably high (typical corporate stuff), and a lot of higher ups who don't really understand what it is they make/sell at the company they work for, and they all fear for their jobs and they fear change in a direction they're not familiar with (which in many cases is EVERY direction, since they're basically sailing a ship in waters they're not really familiar with at all) ... so keeping their scope limited helps them defend/justify their position in the food chain, whilst expanding from trying to cover all bases with a single product to appealing to a broader group by offering larger product variety is a frightening concept. If you're in a situation where you're simply not capable of familiarizing yourself with the product you're selling, it's easier to just have to sell "that product that we make", rather than approach the market and inquire about their needs/interests and be able to go "Well, we have a product like that in our catalog!".

^ This is pretty much a large summary of what I've already said.

Corporate people aren't in the business of playing games, rather, they are in the business of making money.

[Code_R]