Kickstarter
Mostly the campaigns I’ve signed up for have either been rock-solid and professional (specific shoutouts to Andy Kitkowski, luke crane, and Jason Morningstar for repeat high-quality service, and everyone else for the one-off campaigns I’ve participated in), or have been unprofessional clusterfucks (no I’m not calling anyone out, you vultures).
It’s weird how one bad clusterfuck will sour me on the whole process though. I’m not sure what my personal ratio is. Maybe 10 good to 1 bad? Utterly unfair to the “good” campaigns.
There. That should be adequately uncontroversial.
#rpgaday #rpgaday2017
Kickstarter: “I was cheated outta ten bucks by a duo of Russian snake oil salesmen. Not even kidding.”
True story.
So far I’ve only had one total failure (IE took the money and ran)… I’ve had a few that were lackluster, but so many successful (delayed at worst) that I don’t even want count the ratio… it’s basically 0. Just… do due diligence before you back something.
We should summon Ralph Mazza to unleash his torrent of data from like a thousand KS projects 🙂
You should be thanking Steve Segedy if we’ve done the slightest thing right.
I haven’t had many total clusters. Lots of people biting off more then they can chew and the pain there from, but for me that’s the whole deal with Kickstarter. As long as you go in with idea that you’re funding dreams not buying product such things are 1 part price of admission and 1 part, that’s what I paid to be a part of.
Most of those actually finally deliver.
Storm Hollow was supposed to deliver Summer of 2013. Just got it last week. Gorgeous and amazing, but a perfect example of under prepared dreamers biting off more than they could chew.
Sabretron was supposed to deliver November of 2014 with essentially electronic boffer swords that lit up like light sabres and record successful hits, and track lives like a melee version of laser tag. They were a team of engineers and had fully functioning prototypes ready to go. And then they discovered that the design that worked for hand made prototypes couldn’t be scaled up for Mass production. Still haven’t delivered, but now they’re working on a less ambitious version to deliver while trying to secure funding for the dream version they originally wanted. Some people are pissed and demanding refunds. I just think it’s cool to be part of it.
Hmm, I’ve had one bad experience out of 5… The bad has at least delivered some of it’s product.
3 of the 4 good ones were Burning Wheel Codex, Torchbearer, and Middermark, all of which were basically BWHQ replacing it’s home grown Summer Secret Surprise pre-ordering with Kickstarter. Absolutely the best experience.
The other success, which HAS been delayed, but has delivered most of the product now, is the Classic RuneQuest Kickstarter.
I don’t mind naming the bad experience, the City State of the Invincible Overlord Kickstarter. It has delivered most of the stretch goal PDF maps, and they do keep us in the loop about progress even if it’s glacially slow.
I’m lucky in that I haven’t had any truly awful experiences. But I also agree with Ralph’s first paragraph above.
And delays don’t really bother me as long as there’s an update every so often.
As a “superbacker” (yes, I find that somewhat embarrassing), I’ve found that of the projects I’ve backed that have completed (or obviously never will):
~80% deliver roughly on time or late-but-I-sorta-expected-that
~20% are very late but the product was still cool
~2% were just fucked (scam-y, or lie-ridden, or poorly-communicated, or serious health issues overtaken; or some combo of those)
Overall I’m pretty happy with the results.
Tomer Gurantz also a superbacker (ugh) and those are about my percentages as well.
I will never, ever, ever give up on the idea that Powerchords is still going to deliver.
Seriously, it is only 7 years late. This could still happen.
Right?
RIGHT?
I’ve backed over 950 projects and my percentages are a bit different, more like 70/30/1. Some of that might be because I’ve gotten better at not backing vaporware and don’t particularly care if stuff is late.