Stars Reach, Raph Koster's highly ambitious "galaxy sandbox MMORPG", has been in development for several years, but just took a somewhat unexpected direction -- a Kickstarter to finalize development:
Developed by industry veterans, including the visionary behind Ultima Online and Star Wars Galaxies, Stars Reach pushes the boundaries of simulation and immersion in MMOs, delivering an experience where your choices shape the universe.
With your support, we’ll build a game that is truly for the players, where you can become a pioneer in a galaxy and your every action leaves a lasting impact.
Stars Reach has been funded by investors for the last five years, so we are well along in development. We have already built the core technology, and the game is playable right now. We have multiple planets, combat, crafting, fully modifiable worlds, player building, outer space, and more, all working already. There are already hundreds of players who have been playing for six months, adventuring and building cities together.
The Kickstarter itself is expected to launch in a month or so, but you can follow the page here.
"This is our way of taking more control over our own destiny, in a way that we think will benefit our players the most," Raph tells me.
That's not to say they're moving away from traditional fundraising completely: "We’ve been in active conversations with a number of folks over the holidays and in the new year," he tells me. "But in this kind of world we can’t wait around to see if something happens there."
By "kind of world", he means a highly volatile investment ecosystem, where online games -- especially ambitious, completely new IP like Stars Reach -- are struggling to get continued funding.
Here's the economic situation now, as Koster see it:
"Fortunately, our investors have been great," Raph tells me. "Those that are staying active in games investing are huge believers in us and continue supporting us every way they can.
"The funding environment for games has changed a lot in the past 2-3 years, with investments hugely down across the board. Like, down from $10 billion dollars to $1.7 billion across the industry as a whole. I’ve been saying lately that it’s the worst it’s been since maybe the crash in 1982." (Emphasis mine!)
"And that has more to do with the people who are funding the games VCs themselves. (Remember, VCs don’t have unlimited amounts of money! They depend on their own investors, called Limited Partners.) Those VCs already have an unprecedented number of companies to help out that have sprung up over the past few years, and a ton less money coming in for games.
"So we have a much larger number of game startups than ever before, and investment money that’s been shifting away from games as a whole. Deconstructor of Fun had a good article with graphs covering this just yesterday, in their article on mobile game predictions.
"On the publisher side, more of them are focusing on their established studios and less on the newer studios they’ve already invested in, as you’ve seen from the ongoing list of studio closures over the past year, and already some this year.
"If it’s been rough in investing, it’s been even harder in publishing. Put all that together, and if it’s been challenging for a company like us with tens of thousands of signups, a huge Discord, and successful testing with a super-engaged player base (who we are so, so incredibly grateful for). Imagine how hard it is for people closer to getting started than they are to shipping!
"So… we actually consider ourselves extremely fortunate to be able to do this! And besides, we also develop faster, and find ourselves more focused and energized doing so with a real audience."
I'm not surprised with the struggle, unfortunately. Advising a couple game-related startups lately, it's been the worst environment I've ever seen myself -- even for genuinely interesting projects.
As for Stars Reach's Kickstarter, you can follow their social media/join their Discord, where players are talking with Raph and team about what crowdfunding tiers make the most sense.
"If they happen to be investors," Raph adds, "they can reach out [directly]."
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I hope Raph makes this happen. I'm not a shooter-type; I want to explore, build, share; the setting looks just right. I'm more a Trekker than Star-Wars fan.
A bit of starship combat might be fun, but running about with a gun is not what I imagine an advanced-enough species would do.
I could be wrong, but I hope not!
Posted by: Iggy 1.0 | Thursday, January 16, 2025 at 01:08 PM