Company's like Mantic games who have already put 4 projects into Kickstarter and have drawn a total of $1,976,527, so far. Are they being greedy? Using Kickstarter to fund a project they could of easily funded them self's with the profits from the games they have already had Kickstarted. Now I have nothing against Mantic Games and I'm still debating about buying Dreadball or not. But are company's like this taking away from other people that really do need a Kickstarter, rather than an already established company that sells there products world wide.
Today I saw a set of videos depicting the "tropes" towards women in computer games. Nothing wrong with what she is doing the YouTube videos are well made and informative if you buy into the feminist view of the videos. And wile very well done and edited they are at the end of the day just YouTube videos. I then found out that she got a kick starter for the videos. A kick starter for what is nothing more than a Vlog. She originally wanted $6000. And has some how managed to rake in $158,922................. for a YouTube video............ (So stay tuned for my YouTube Vlog about the constant brutal murders of male AI characters in video games)
Now what made this even more of a "how the hell moment", was the fact that Jason Mews, has been touring the US showing the new Jay and Silent Bob: Super Groovy Cartoon Movie. Now Jason and his wife Jordan, paid cartoonists, voice actors, advertising costs, editors, studio time, cinema time. Everything you would expect from a feature film. For £69000 less than half of what some one got to make a YouTube Vlog, on the same note as this, It cost Kevin Smith a mere £27,575 to make Clerks, one of if not the best theatrical comedy's.
Is it going to get to the point where EA games are going to ask for kick starters every year for the same old Fifa or NFS game?
We will have North Korea asking for a Kickstarter to increase the range of there missiles, the more you pledge the the further away they will target them from you.
In my honest opinion Kickstarter has a Pool of money. And people and company's a like are exploiting this pool of money so they have more in there back pocket. I keep a Kickstarter advertised here on the blog, but I will never advertise one for a company that is making multiple kick starters in order to line there pockets more and more, when they already have an established business that is successful.
If it continues the way it is going, then I fear eventually the pool will dry up.
I have been pondering the exact same thing lately. I look at how much Mantic are raking in on the latest kickstarter for Deadzone and have to wonder what they actually do with all that money... they state themselves something along the lines of "all the concepts and sculpts are done" so what do they actually need all that cash for?
ReplyDeleteI think Kickstarter is a great thing but to me companies like Mantic are exploiting it somewhat. I'm sure their products are great quality (they certainly seem like it from the pictures) but funding what essentially amounts to promotion and distribution through Kickstarter really seems in the end self-defeating. What happens if Kickstarter does dry up? Has Mantic learned any lessons as a company about how to handle these aspects of its operation without the huge influx of cash that Kickstarter generates for them? What happens if people fund a kickstarter for one of their products and it turns out to be absolute crap? That's going to have a very far-reaching effect on their business!
I could of course just be talking rot and I do wish Mantic a lot of success (I will pick up Dreadball as soon as I can and the scenery for Deadzone looks fantastic). Personal feelings aside I guess this is what Kickstarter was intended to be used for at the end of the day and if people don't want to fund a project then they don't have to.
(Great blog btw. Just found it today and enjoyed what I've read so far!)