Neal Stephenson's CLANG! Not Yet Crowdfunded -- Game Kickstarters Reached Saturation Point?

CLANG!, the swordfighting game Kickstarter backed by uber geek Neal Stephenson (who I interviewed about the project here), still hasn't raised its $500,000 goal after 20 days of pledge raising. It will probably reach that target, but the surprise is it hasn't surpassed that goal days ago -- not even with Stephenson's backing, not even with the endorsement of Valve's Gabe Newell, another geek icon, who made a cameo in the Kickstarter video. (Above, blacksmithing a crowbar, of course.) When you compare this to other successful game Kickstarters, it's hard to avoid the conclusion that enthusiasm over crowdfunders -- at least for gaming crowdfunders, at least for the kind of enthusiasm which results in actual pledges -- is starting to wane.

Compare and contrast:

• Double Fine's adventure game Kickstarter raised over $700K in 24 hours.
• The Wasteland 2 RPG Kickstarter raised nearly $3 million.
• The Shadowrun RPG Kickstarter raised almost $2 million.

And so on. Of course, these projects and others are backed by developers well known in their own right, but none with the name recognition of Stephenson or Newell. And this isn't for an obscure project -- it's for a swordfighting game, for god's sake. So I think we're seeing a definite sign that the market for game crowdfunders have reached a saturation point. Hopefully CLANG! does finally reach its goal, because otherwise, we'll go from saturation, to bear market.

That said, go here to consider pledging to CLANG! Because you know, hey, Stephenson, swordfighting, indie non-corporate crowdfunding and all that good stuff.

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Comments

[Fleep Tuque]

I don't think game funding on Kickstarter is saturated, I think sword fighting is a weird/boring niche for a video game.

By all accounts, I should be a funder. I've funded many other Kickstarter campaigns. I love games. I love the idea of games being funded by grassroots efforts. And I'm a huge fan of Stephenson's fiction (I've read them all! The longer the better! The more footnotes the better!)

Alas, I have zero interest in sword fighting. I have even less interest in a game about sword fighting.

;)

[Tali]

Motion control has, by and large, fizzled. The market wore out with Wii even before MS and Sony could get their game going.
So now is not the time to launch a motion control scheme which nobody will have room for, and which cannot provide the force feedback to make it any more interesting than waving a Move wand around.

So however much street cred Neal Stephenson is pulling, it is just not a good/feasible idea.
The interesting point here is perhaps that the Kickstarter funders are savvy enough to evaluate this, and not go blindly with the celebrity factor.

(Leap, now, is a different story...)

[Iggy]

@Fleep, I *so* disagree with you, even though I agree with you. How's that for a first sentence?

I understand that shooters do not the world of gaming make, but I hate hate hate shooters. They bore me silly now that I'm 50-something. In my early teens, well, woo hoo but that was decades ago and Pong was it.

But a bloody bout with swords...swashbuckling? Holding back the Saracens as Roland with his mighty sword? If it can scale big enough, to be on the walls of Minas Tirith, before the hosts of the Dark Lord and with a realistic controller for that blade of legend from the lost island of Numenor?

Right on. (the disagree part)

And that makes me an outlying data point in the world of gaming. You may be right that swords don't a mass-market game make. Pity.

[Ehrman Digfoot]

I opened Facebook today to find two completely unrelated friends promoting their respective kickstarter game projects. I've had enough. I'd rather learn a new design program than play a silly game.

[Fleep Tuque]

@Iggy It might be because I'm a cleric, not a tank. :)

[froggie]

Proof.. that if you don't know if you're making a GAME or a VIRTUAL WORLD Simulator,then even being Neal and even having a great demo video, cant save your ass.:)

People can see that the "idea" is flawed as a Product the can enjoy.

[Arcadia Codesmith]

I love the idea. Motion control combat simulators to date have been huge disappointments to anybody who's actually trained in fencing, broadsword or kendo. We're all waiting for somebody to do it right.

But... there's the rub. The number of us who have trained with a sword is small. There's a large number who've dreamed of it, but not many willing to get out their chairs and do something about it. And truthfully, even if they did, it'd take months or years of practice before they ceased getting pwned (even worse, in some cases getting pwned by old ladies).

I hope they make goal and start work soon. It's a niche game... but it's one of my niches :)

[Adeon Writer]

People are jaded by motion controls and swordplay. As Neil says, there has been so many failures it's hard to believe this one will do it right.

[James Cook]

I pledged, but the fact that I'm going to have to buy a $100 controller to play the game is a big downer.

[James Cook]

That's why we stopped development on "the rig" VR immersion suit in the early days of Linden... No one buys PC peripherals.

[Pussycat Catnap]

"I think sword fighting is a weird/boring niche for a video game."

Yeah.

Basically, its a kickstarter to fund Streetfighter. That's been out since... 1992?

[Hamlet Au]

"No one buys PC peripherals."

That's true for the mass market, James, I'm just surprised there's not even 20,000 people willing to pay $25 for a game with a $100 peripheral. That's by Stephenson, backed by Newell and a buncha other top game devs.

[shockwave yareach]

These guys are well able to get traditional funding from traditional routes to get their funds. Crowdfunds are for small fry like me to get a start at something; it's not a replacement for banks or VC. I won't fund the big names and I won't fund BMW -- they can get money the regular route whereas ordinary folks can't.

[Pathfinder]

@shockwave - nailed it

[Hamlet Au]

That's an understandable reaction, but I think it misses the fact that even big stars like Stephenson only get corporate money with strings attached, which often/usually compromise the vision they have. Crowdfunding is a great opportunity to eliminate the corporate middle man and form a direct relationship between the artist and his/her fanbase.

[Iggy]

Big fry, small fry...I just want to leap from roof to roof with a scimitar in my hand and my burnoose flapping in the breeze, as I sneak up on the infidels from Castile and Leon.

Long live Boabdil! Granada will never fall to them!