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SINCE its launch three years ago, Kickstarter, a website on which people who
want to make things can ask other people to pay for their projects, has offered
hope to penniless musicians, artists and designers. But what the world s modern
Medicis really want to bankroll is new video games. Of the ten most-funded
Kickstarter projects, five are related to video games (see chart). Three
Double Fine Adventure , Wasteland 2 and Shadowrun Returns are actual games.
Two are bits of gamer hardware: an open-source games console called the OUYA,
and a virtual-reality headset called the Oculus Rift.
One reason that games get financed is that gamers are tech-savvy. With an
average age in America of 37, they also have plenty of disposable income. They
expect no return on their money, save a free or cut-price copy of the game
itself.
There are structural reasons within the games industry for Kickstarter s
popularity, too. As development budgets for games have risen, says Aubrey
Hesselgren, a games-industry programmer, big publishers such as Electronic Arts
and Activision have become risk-averse. Like Hollywood studios before them,
they have taken the safe option of churning out endless sequels to
already-popular titles in big-selling genres, such as military-themed shooting
games. That leaves a long tail of disgruntled fans who can t find new games
they enjoy. The three biggest Kickstarter games are all from underserved
genres.
Meanwhile, developers are unhappy, too. Making games is a hard way to earn a
living. Contracts are often short. Long hours are common. Deadlines arrive like
a never-ending shower of Tetris blocks. Publishers keep most development
studios on a tight leash; many developers feel creatively stifled. Stories of
burnout and depression abound. The games industry doesn t retain developers
very well, notes Mr Hesselgren dryly. But it s pretty good at training up
rebels.
Raising money from fans offers a route to creative control and sane working
conditions. I don t have any crazy people [from a publisher] in my office
telling me what to do, enthuses Brian Fargo, the veteran developer in charge
of Wasteland 2 .
The combination of dissatisfied fans and mutinous developers is leavened with a
dose of nostalgia for the good old days. Wasteland 2 is a sequel to a game
made in 1988. Shadowrun Returns is a computer version of a pen-and-paper
role-playing game released in 1989. Double Fine Adventure is an adventure
game, a relaxed, cerebral genre that has been commercially dead for more than a
decade.
As word spreads among fans and developers about the possibilities offered by
cutting publishers out of the loop and raising money directly from fans, the
number of video-game projects on Kickstarter is mushrooming. Not all are
successful, and some observers worry about what might happen when a fan-funded
game flops. Still, Mr Fargo hopes that Kickstarter could evolve into a
fully-fledged alternative funding source. He has promised to plough 5% of the
profits from Wasteland 2 back into other Kickstarter games, and has
encouraged others to do the same.