An article about Kickstarted games, and a request

[UncleSporky]

I hope this is an appropriate place to post this. Apologies if this sort of thing has been discussed and asked for already.

Today I read this long blog posting:

http://odiousrepeater.wordpress.com/2012/04/20/dragged-kickstarting-and-screaming/

It's on the subject of naivete on the part of both Kickstarter backers and developers, lamenting that developers make nebulous promises and have little to show to their backers, who offer funding regardless.

It's quite a negative posting, even complaining specifically about Brian's pitch for its lack of useful details. I have more confidence than this article does in the team at inXile, and perhaps it goes too far in its criticism, but it still got me thinking. I really don't know much about the upcoming development of Wasteland 2!

When can we expect some details? Will we ever reach a point where we get to see parts of the initial design documents? I'd love to learn the sorts of things that go into planning a moderately large game like this.

Of course the team at inXile don't have any responsibility to share this kind of information with us anytime soon, or at all. After all, this source of funding has offered freedom from publishers that ask for this sort of thing. But I would still be very interested in seeing anything they are willing to offer.

I hope this isn't seen as entitlement at all, or even impatience. Maybe I assume too much about how far along the game might be in its planning stages, and if so, that's fine. I'd just love to know more about where it's headed.

[quantumnerd]

I second this motion. I have a lot of confidence that you guys will, at very worst, make something akin to a remake of the original (which would be good enough), assuming the project implodes on itself, which it probably won't. Still, I'd like to see some more transparency. A couple mockup screenshots, some high-level design documents. If you have them, I'd love to see some.

[Brother None]

For someone who opens up by saying he doesn't get arrogance, he sure comes across as an arrogant, entitled prick.

inXile has been perfectly open. They had little specifics not because they didn't want to share, but because they were in very early pre-production. Yes. They does mean we to have some trust in them. But as Fargo said, that author really shows too little respect for the consumer. We're smart enough to know what risk we're taking, and that we won't like everything about Wasteland. All it promised was to be a turn-based, party-based Wasteland sequel, and that's all we can expect.

The lack of transparancy isn't because inXile doesn't want to share, guys. It's because they don't want to show stuff before it's ready, or before they're looking for feedback. The design phases of this game should be very open, and yes, we will eventually see things like a vision doc, mockups, etc.

[CaptainPatch]

At worst, we the backers are simply making an "educated guess". We can see Brian's "track record", along with the resumes of the people he is collaborating with and we can reasonably conclude that we WILL get our money's worth from this investment. Heck, the large majority of us invested less than what we might spend going on a movie date where the movie turns out to be crap. Double heck, if you equate time spent in the Wasteland 2 forums as being measured in "movie-hours", I'm paying just pennies per hour for this entertainment. That is, I've _already_ gotten my money's worth.

[Bryy]

For someone who opens up by saying he doesn't get arrogance, he sure comes across as an arrogant, entitled prick.

Entitled? I assume you use Entitled in the stereotypical "he thinks he is owed" something sense - which does not make any sense. Of course he is owed a reason to give his money. The entire point was that Kickstarter *could* bridge the information gap between dev and player, but it doesn't seem to be doing so (in my experience so far, people tend to get mad when you tell them how video games are made; hell, people said that Doublefine should have paid for the rewards out of their own pockets).

I also don't see what exactly makes him a prick. He was not attacking Fargo, Weisman, or Shaefer. There is a distinct difference between criticism and harassment. You're getting that he's a prick out of... what? The fact that he used Wasteland 2 specifically as an example? Aside from the Publisher as Child bit, it was an extremely bland video.

[Brother None]

Of course he is owed a reason to give his money.

He's not owed anything. If he doesn't like the model, he shouldn't donate any money. The system is based on an amount of trust. Guys like Schafer and Fargo can get away with providing less because we know they know what they're doing. He is treating it as if the Kickstarter models means we're stockholders, publishers, people who have a right to information throughout the process. We're not. We're pledgers, and we have a right to not less and no more than what is described on the Kickstarter page.

He also comes across as arrogant because he derides the budgets as implausible. As if he knows better than the professionals, experienced videogame people who have been doing this for years. He's got no idea, but he deigns to talk down to people because he overrates his own knowledge base specifically.

And yes, he does come across like he has it in for Fargo specificially. Going "I also predict that at least one of them will get picked up by a big-name publisher (please, let this happen to Wasteland 2, so we get to hear Brian Fargo suddenly love working with a big-name publisher that’s not like the rest of them)" just seems petulant like hell.

So no, I'm not taking the article (video?) very seriously, nor was I taking the earlier similar attempt by Penny Arcade seriously. Anyone who hasn't realized the problems that can stem from having to trust people simply is spending their money foolishly. Kickstarter is a risk, that's why I've only pledged to DoubleFine and inXile myself, because I feel secure they will deliver. The problems with PA and this odious guy is that they badly underestimate the consumer, and pretend like the consumer has no responsibility whatsoever here to sensibly spend his/her money.