Crowdfunding

Crowd funding is an interesting, sometimes controversial topic. The basic premise is that instead of relying on one of the big videogame publishers like Electronic Arts or Ubisoft to pay your development team to create a game. Through websites like Kickstarter or Indiegogo individual people can contribute to fund a game independently.

Basically a person or team of people create a page on one of the aforementioned websites and describe through images, videos and text what they want to make. They set a minimum funding goal wherein after that is met the project will be “Green lit” and will go on with production. People then view the project page and decide if they want to contribute to have the game made. There are more elements involved but that is the gist of it.

Now one thing that should be made clear is that when you contribute to a game on one of these sites you are not buying stock or owning a piece of the game. You receive rewards for donating like a copy of the game or a t-shirt and the like but that is it. The main reward for most people is the feeling of contributing to have a game made, whereas without your help it may not have.

Herein lies one of the controversial parts of Crowdfunding. Some people have the misconception that when they donate to a campaign, they are entitled to something more than what they are owed. Such as “Hey I helped pay for this game! I should be able to dictate the way it is developed” or having feelings that they should get a cut of the game’s profits.  

Star Citizen

However when you look at things with a positive light, Crowdfunding can be a pretty special and enjoyable experience. While it does depend on the developer, being a backer to a game you are really looking forward to can be very rewarding. Looking at the example of Star Citizen which is the highest funded Crowd sourced games ever. The developers maintain a very close line of communication with their backers and fans. They even release very early versions of the game for people to give constructive feedback.

With the smash success of a game like Star Citizen will more developers look toward Crowd funding a source of revenue? Allowing them to develop games without the ever-present publisher looking over their shoulder, pushing for release dates that may not be feasible. Kickstarter has definitely shaken up the games industry, and I think most would say for the better.

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Sean McParland

Sources

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/cig/star-citizen