I’m a Backer: Forsaken Fortress
Its that time of the week again, fellow fanatics, when we look for great projects on Kickstarter, and I shout to the rooftops about one that I am really passionate about. This week in ‘I’m a Backer,’ I pry myself away from all the great comic book projects that have captured my attention for the better part of the last month, and again turn my attention to my other favorite category: games.
This week I am proud to bring you Forsaken Fortress, a genre crossing RPG of post apocalyptic strategy.
Let’s get to it, shall we?
I’m a Skeptic: Pathfinder Online
This game makes Dungeons and Dragons look like Tunnels and Trolls..
I’m a big fan of the Pathfinder RPG. I’m a supporter of Paizo Publishing (with my hard-earned dollars and my preciously limited gaming time), and I truly admire how they leveraged the d20 SRD to make a game that is light-years ahead of their competition (Trials and Termagants 9th edition, right?). I’ve even backed projects that leverage the Pathfinder SRD on Kickstarter. I’m also an online gamer who has played his shares of MMORPG titles. So imagine my surprise and delight when I caught wind of a Pathfinder MMO on Kickstarter!
I was poised to back it. And then I started having second thoughts. Peek below the fold to find out why.
Christmas and Kickstarter
Tis the season to be shopping, for better or worse. Don’t you wish that it was about the giving, or that the thought really counted? These days it is all about the presents, they’re really the only the game in town.
Oh, you thought I was talking about Christmas? Well, I suppose I could see the confusion. Though some of those statements are equally applicable, it should be obvious to my loyal readers that I was talking about Kickstarter.
Though I don’t soon expect to see houses bedecked in lime green lights, people singing Kickmas carols door to door, or sitting around by the warm glow of their monitor searching for hypothetical presents for next year, you have to admit, there are certain resonances.
Come, join me around the hypothetical fire, and we will discuss it further.
To Sunday, or not to Sunday
You may have noticed that there was no guest post this Sunday or last. While I will try to start up more guest posts in the future, given how low the traffic has been on Sunday, the day will likely be moved to something a bit more well trafficked. That of course begs the question – what should we do with Sunday’s? For three months we have had a post up every single day. Is that the right answer? Do you, our loyal readers, like that or would a reduced schedule suffice?
While we’re on the topic, are there other things that any of you would like to bring up? Are there any particular posts you would like to see explored more often? Any topics you think we cover too much?
Though I always appreciate feedback, this post is JUST to solicit feedback, so by all means, let me know your thoughts.
Winter is Coming
Winter is coming. Northern words. Stark words.
In Colorado they also happen to be true words. Though winter proper doesn’t start for a few more weeks, the changing of the seasons has put me in a particularly reflective mood. Time flies when you are having fun, or busy as hell, or both. Life has certainly been all of the above lately. Between the frenetic pace of work and travel, and the demands of a successful Kickstarter launch of Caffeineforge’s first product, my mood would best be described, I think, as harried. With the changing of the seasons though, I expect (well, hope) this will ease off somewhat.
Before we can start our (hopefully) relaxing winter though, let’s take a look back at the last season.
Uneven Performance
Everything in life has rules. It’s just the way it works. They range from the impossible-to-violate (physics), through the strictly enforced (legal), all the way down to the merely suggested (cultural, social, ethical). And that’s fine with me – sometimes the man and his laws are stifling, but often as not rules are put in place for a good reason. Crowdfunding is no exception to this trend. As I discussed in a previous post, one of the big differentiators between the two main crowdfunding sites is the strictness of their rules.
- Indiegogo will let you do most anything, and is just a platform for fund raising.
- Kickstarter requires a concrete end goal, specific funding requirements, and a whole list of things projects can and can’t offer.
In the past I have argued that one of the reasons Kickstarter is more successful than Indiegogo is because it has used it’s rules to create a significantly higher average quality level on its website, and that this drives traffic. In my own Kickstarter I noticed that most of the dollars pledged to Wardenclyffe came from these window shoppers. Unfortunately, I have also noticed lately that Kickstarter is not always applying its own rules evenly.
Lets explore the issue.
The Life and Death of a Dollar
Easy come, easy go, right? Though today I wanted to talk specifically about the budget for the recently successful project, The Wardenclyffe Horror, I thought I would start off with a different financial topic: the Lottery.
Last night, as most of you know, Powerball hit more than half a billion dollars, and apparently that’s my number. You see – until that point not only had I never played the lottery, but I had never been tempted to play it. I blame my father and his stable of sensible sayings for that tendency. Growing up, I always heard that gambling was a tax on those who can’t do math, and generally, I am inclined to agree. In this case though, I think that two dollars is worth the ridiculously small chance (1 in 175 million, or 11 times rarer than being struck by lighting.)
I didn’t win, of course. The bizarre ‘what-if-I-did’ conversations and flights of fantasies that this ticket allowed for though, we’re totally worth the price of admission. Two dollars for a few hours of entertainment for a few hours? That’s almost as cheap as playing wow, and only slightly less worthwhile.
I’m a Backer: The Bargain
I remember a few weeks back, when I lamented the fact that I couldn’t find enough good comic projects to back as we covered game after game. Now it seems we might have the same problem, but in reverse. Kickstarter has had a deluge of great comic book projects the last few weeks. At this moment, five of the ten active projects I am currently backing – fully half, are comic books. This week in our “I’m a Backer” series, we continue on the comic train and cover the Wonderful new comic project, The Bargain.
When they say that they don’t make them like they used to, I believe they are talking about this book; it’s art oozes quality more appropriate to the time period of the story, 1955, than today. Interested? Read on.
Onerous Requirements
Yesterday I talked about one of those things you would probably never find if you weren’t looking for it. I also talked about publishing. While I don’t generally like to talk about related things two days in a row like this, I discovered something last night that just cannot wait: a shadowy criminal organization that thrives on ink and the tears of new authors, and that’s not even a misleading/alarmist/hyperbolic statement meant to keep you reading.
Okay, so maybe that description takes it a little far, let’s call it titillating. I really do want to talk to you today, about a business arrangement that can only really be described as a cartel.
The Ransom Model
One of my favorite things about the internet is how you can come across a whole new topic. One where you did not even suspect its existence until you found it. Its happened before, and I hope that it keeps happening; this weeks discovery – was thanks to Mr. Greg Stolze and his project on Kickstarter.
I stumbled on to How to Make a Book Safe the other day while perusing the latest projects to surface. I noticed two things immediately: that he was only asking for $530 projects, and that he has created 23 projects to date. Both of these seemed odd, so I decided to dig a little deeper and found that the majority of his project offerings, 19 of which have been successful to date, are of similar low dollar amounts, with just a couple one to two thousand dollar RPG products thrown in for variety.
I had no idea what to make of this, so I asked him; if you’re interested, then feel free to follow along after the fold.
Caffeineforge 