I’ve been feeling a really huge wave of blahs rolling over me regarding Kickstarter lately. I think it’s because of my ever-lengthening list of really old projects that have yet to deliver. This is not a calling-out! But it’s definitely tamped my interest in backing stuff going forward.
From oldest to newest, stuff that is yet to be fulfilled:
Project Dark (original delivery date: August 2014): I think I saw an email in the past quarter. Mentally I’ve written it off; can’t even remember what excited me about it in the first place. TBH I’m more pumped about Blades in the Dark, which feels to me like the same zip code.
Timewatch (original delivery date: November 2014): I get emails every once in a while. Pelgrane is doing a good job of keeping everyone informed. I have no doubt it’ll appear eventually. Probably a good cautionary tale about overpromising enormous projects. So much material, yikes.
Last Days of Anglekite (original delivery date: April 2015): I know Mark Diaz Truman will tell me yet again that, yes yes, I got my damned PDFs so stfu. That’s true! I still want my damned printed books. They’re coming, maybe, unless he’s blown his 7th Sea windfall on a yacht or something. (No seriously, I know it’s coming. We had a really interesting conversation about the Chaos Worlds stuff in another thread. I learned things!)
Epyllion (original delivery date: September 2015): Okay now I’m actually a tiny bit surprised this hasn’t dropped yet. I played it last year with Marissa Kelly and it felt exceptionally well-cooked. It’s solid! And it’s something I’m genuinely looking forward to, which, you know, surprises me given it’s basically My Little Pony. Fingers crossed the project hasn’t gotten swallowed by more pressing priorities.
Blades in the Dark (original delivery date: November 2015): Having played the starter kit a few times, I think it’s gonna be a game I’ll run heavily for a while and then maybe not again. I’m very happy to have backed it! But it’s fussy in ways I don’t find that useful. A swing and a miss? Maybe I’ll discover some amazing new killer app in its final version.
Other World Mapper (original delivery date: December 2015): I’ve actually started keeping up with their beta downloads. This software is so rad. I don’t really play games that require elaborate world-building but I gotta say, I might start one just to use this software. Very neat. No idea how it stacks up against the competition because I don’t really need or use it.
The Dark North (original delivery date: May 2016): Okay so they’re officially late by one day, but I am looking forward to this, still. I have ideas about using the visuals to seed an Apocalypse World: Second Edition game. Haven’t heard from them in a while, but whatever, maybe next quarter it’ll be here.
Everything else I’ve backed is still in the future, so no worries until I’m worried! But even then, I’m looking at what’s coming and I’m already feeling my interest wane: why did I back Wurm again?
You backed Timewatch? Isn’t that a Gumshoe game?
Oh, man. We’re going to blow up your mailbox soon. 😀
Both of the last Chaos World books had some problems with margins. We’re actually looking at another printer, and we should have those out in the next month or so.
Epyllion is going to print… this week? We’re looking at covers, and picking out papers, etc. Check out Kickstarter updates for a backer preview of the PDF.
Adam D it is! But I’m a huge time travel goober so…
Mark Diaz Truman nice! I’m so glad Epyllion in particular didn’t fall down a hole somewhere. Interesting that you need to change printers to deal with a margin problem! Is that not just a prepress fix they can handle?
Paul Beakley – It’s because it’s POD. If we were doing an offset run…but it’s not a big enough run of books.
Mark Diaz Truman Ugh. I’m glad you were the brave soul to explore that! Freestanding Dungeon World campaigns sure sounded like a winner. :-/
I vaguely remember being excited about TimeWatch…I can’t remember why now. Hopefully when it finally materializes I’ll get excited again. If it was anyone else but Pelgrane behind it (or a handful of other proven entities), I’d have written it off by now.
Looks like a simpler, more user-friendly version of Campaign Cartographer. Great program but takes a bit of learning.
Your list looks like my list! Project: Dark was particularly frustrating, because so many parts of it are up my alley. But my excitement has really waned.
Is Wurm the prehistoric one? I’d play it, but I can think of zero other people who would so I passed on it. True Fact: I wrote a terrible game with the same premise my senior year of high school.
Last day for Sol if you want in on that. And I’m eyeing the Pebble KS, me.
I got my Fate worlds books AND my Rippers Resurrected books today. Because I’m real cool.
Here I sit waiting for Far West. Gareth has yet again promised it’ll be out this month. Well I mean it was supposed to be done last month but he stubbed a toe or something. But this month for sure.
Oh, Project: Dark where art thou? I feel your pain. I was excited about this RPG, played the beta kit a few times and enjoyed it, but it seems to be perpetually held up on art, rules tweaks, and writing. I was under the impression it was a lot closer to baked than it apparently is. Oh well; I guess I will wait….
Blades in the Dark I also backed. I’m happy that I will still be alive and relatively young when it finishes. It seems like progress is happening on that.
waiting on Timewatch and blades as well, both of which seem to have had scale of interest issues, but they’ve both been communicative and, as you noted, have reliable names behind them
also on my list are:
paranoia seems to have been completely rewritten since the campaign, eta: Jun 2015
Bulldogs fate core simply seems to have taken longer to complete than expected, although my softcover should be shipping any day, eta: oct 2015
city of the dead was one I backed on recommendation of the 2 GMs, 1 Mic podcast for the hell of it, not really expecting it to fund-it did, and progress has been sluggish, with spotty communication-when (if) I get my hardcover copy though, I’ll hopefully feel less buyer’s remorse, eta: sept 2015
dungeon crawl classics ran into some printing issues due to printing stretch goals-was hoping this would be a nice birthday present to myself, but it’s been set back several months-they’ve offered a discounted softcover printing as an add on sale to bridge that gap, which is cool, but it’s still later than the original ship estimate, eta: apr 2016
Crimson creek card game would also have been a nice birthday present (fwiw undying softcover happened to fill that gap, arriving exactly on my birthday), but the printer couldn’t work with the rgb color profile, and it should ship in the next few weeks, eta:apr 2106
I’m still confident that Project Dark will show up and be awesome. I’m still excited for it. But I am disappointed in how long it has taken, no question, and I don’t expect to have it before the end of the year.