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How long until the big boys start using crowdfunding as well?
Nevulus
Member UncommonPosts: 1,288
In the past couple of years (ok maybe more than a couple), the crafted beer industry has really taken off. It is no longer a secret, even the ordinary consumer is reaching for that local homebrew as oppose to the mass marketed commercial brands.
Then one day it happened, big commercial brands began buying out small craft beer companies in an attempt to stay relevant. You see, the small craft culture that they scoffed at for so long finally began to eat away at their big boy profits. Slowly at first, but surely indeed.
To make it worse, these same big brand companies began marketing variants of their beer under new names and logos in an attempt to fool their consumer-base into thinking they were purchasing a craft beer, Redd's Apple Ale anyone?
Which leads me to my question, when do you think the big boys in the gaming industry will jump on the crowdfunding bandwagon in order to develop their games? Or how many different ways could the big boys think of getting their cut from this new indie developer-boom that's been bubbling over the past few years?
Looks like it is too late, both EA and Square Enix are looking to get in on the action, I wonder who is next:
http://kotaku.com/5911567/ea-offers-crowdfunded-games-three-months-of-free-distribution-on-origin
http://www.gamespot.com/articles/square-enix-launching-crowdfunding-program/1100-6415484/
Comments
I don't think either of those articales points to them USING crowdfunding. They are just making tools for other indie companies to use crowdfunding. I think they are trying to make money off of crowd funding through distribution much like valve not by jumping into the Arena themselves.
Why would they need to? Why would they want to? By Crowdfunding you make yourself responsible to your funders. they are legally investors, which means they get a say..... I doubt EA, Square, Blizzard or ANY of the big-boys would want that. And I can't imagine ANY gamer wanting to fund a game for EA when they already have more money than god. They don't need it, and if they are smart they wont want it.
How many boxes do you think TOR would have sold if players had been in from Alpha? .... A lot less.
Hence the question above.
Although crowd funding has become popular, I don't think that any big game development company these days would use it directly. One reason is that a company's image is and reputation are very important. If some multi billion dollar giant comes and starts begging for scraps to make their game, it doesn't look very good. There's probably a lot of other reasons why it's not a good idea too that have to do with company management and project planing, since crowd funding doesn't always guarantee you'll be funded.
But I'm sure that they have taken notice. For example, I just saw this the other day: http://store.steampowered.com/app/238750/. It's being developed and published by Ubisoft, but you can purchase "early access" to the game. I wouldn't say it's crowd funding, since it will get made whether or not anyone buys early access , but I think they've seen that people are willing to pay for a game before it is completed (or even begun development in some cases).
lol no they don't. kickstarter is nothing more than a donation to a guy that says he'll try and make a game. If he walks away with your money you'd be screwed as long as he made even a lame attempt at creating something.
Soon we paying for there games to develop while they make millions(skyrim anyone:P)and we only make them rich lol
Hope to build full AMD system RYZEN/VEGA/AM4!!!
MB:Asus V De Luxe z77
CPU:Intell Icore7 3770k
GPU: AMD Fury X(waiting for BIG VEGA 10 or 11 HBM2?(bit unclear now))
MEMORY:Corsair PLAT.DDR3 1866MHZ 16GB
PSU:Corsair AX1200i
OS:Windows 10 64bit
Ive seen game forums where games are still in there alpha stage and people can buy there game so they can continuing develop but many gamers start whining on forums game is to buggy i want my money back.
I think is bad development that more and more games released way to soon under the tag of alpha stage and ask gamers for money something, there is somthing wrong with this whole new kind game development and publishing busines.
More and more i see same trend with so called gamedevelopers as the gamers these days instant uberness and cookies or instant money now or we fail they try cheat there way fast into market becouse the dumb gamers open up there wallet easely anyway so they can make a fast buck and leave.
How many games fail these days becouse to early released?
I think to many.
But goahead give your money i dont realy care if you end up under bridge and they lay on beach on the bahamas with a nice coctail and a beautiful girl:P
Hope to build full AMD system RYZEN/VEGA/AM4!!!
MB:Asus V De Luxe z77
CPU:Intell Icore7 3770k
GPU: AMD Fury X(waiting for BIG VEGA 10 or 11 HBM2?(bit unclear now))
MEMORY:Corsair PLAT.DDR3 1866MHZ 16GB
PSU:Corsair AX1200i
OS:Windows 10 64bit
Well one way to test the waters would be somebody like Rockstar we all know PC gamers are crying out for Red Dead Redemption on the PC,to me Rockstar are crazy to ignore this massive market.
So why not start a Kickstarter after all they need not ask for millions as these games are 2 years away at most so no rush,and pretty sure they would easily get quite a bit of cash from doing this anyway.
This might restore their image after all it was PC gamers that started the company of and funded their games in the first place so running to consoles and ignoring the PC is still stabbing a major customer base in the back.
Surely Star Citizens nearly 22 million has not gone unnoticed by the big publishers and it is fun to see the Wingman rub the publishers noses in it about SC success in nearly every show he does.
No, they don't. No say at all. Once the money is theirs, its theirs. They are expected to deliver on what they promised at the time the money changed hands.
People have this idealistic vision of crowdfunding, how its the people shaping the game. that just isn't true. Its just a (cheaper) way for a game company to acquire capital.
I have always found Kickstarter to be one hell of a gamble if you pony up big bucks,I usually go small as I'm not that rich so if the game goes tits up no big deal,so far I've done well even with the Indie's.
But no doubt people have been burned it's a catch 22 situation the game may or not get made after funding success,but the community can influence the game development and so far in most of my Kickstarters I have voted in some form to influence the development process.
To me that is a massive bonus to be part of something that starts of small then goes mega take SC as an example my hanger is full of free stuff because I put faith in the project it's little incentives like this that mean a lot to an investor in the game like me.
This ^
It's ironic, the OP paints this very relevant simile between micro brews and the gaming industry. That situation is already happening, and yet he chooses to focus only on kickstarters.
While it's unlikely to see many big studios going the kickstarter route (it just isn't enough capital to sustain the MMOs we've been playing), they have been doing a lot to buy out smaller studios and use their recognition as their own.
I'm not sure that the industry leaders would consider crowdfunding, not without some significant changes to prevailing corporate cultures. Corporations tend to think that everything they do is proprietary, including the budgets for major projects. The general population doesn't hear about the cost of development for EQ1 or WoW or other titles. Even if we do hear something, it is most likely someone's guess. Try determining the exact amount it took to develop LotRO. With Crowdfunding, in its current incarnation, everyone can find out the exact amount raised. And, somehow, companies seem to see that information as rather private.
Even publicly held corporations, like SOE, it can be extremely difficult to derive an exact number for something like Vanguard's true cost. The numbers are likely in the fiscal reports, but they are summarized at such a level to be meaningless. A developer might be shuffled from project to project within the company, the project might bounce between reporting organizations within SOE, and the accounting processes might lump certain Vanguard development costs in with those of Free Realms or EQ2. Anything in development at the time might contribute to a specific line in the annual reports, with only vague hints given to stockholders as to the costs of individual projects. There's very little way to track the total cost of a product unless that company develops only that single product. Even then, costs are likely to extend across multiple years and annual reports.
It appears to be that a company believes that knowledge about their project's exact budget could grant some competitor some advantage in the marketplace. That drives the secrecy. I don't really expect major companies to look towards crowdfunding unless there is some mechanism to obscure that amount from the general public, competitors and players alike.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.