Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

What the hell these game developers did with your kickstarter money

kotaku.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 85 posts

Re: What the hell these game developers did with your kickstarter money

#71

Post by ricardobeat »

gavanwoolery wrote: post #70
ricardobeat wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's your opinion of YogVentures? I have a suspicion that developing an open-world game not based on voxels is a very challenging thing, but then I don't work in game dev. edit : should've read the full description. Are the interpolated lines also used for collision/physics?

My opinion is that it is kind of a scam. If they can pull it off, I would love to be proven wrong. But so far all they have is a no-name development team that does not even have a website, and it looks like they just used a prefab engine like Unity to produce their demo video. I've developed with voxels for over 10 years...Marching cubes is nothing new (in fact, I "invented" it on my own without knowing that the algo…

Hey, you're the atomontage guy! I'd give you a couple million if I could :)

Totally agree. There are many examples of developers who seriously underestimated the costs for a full game. With the influx of projects, I believe some kind of vetoing will have to be implemented for projects >50k.

Re: What the hell these game developers did with your kickstarter money

#72

Post by gavanwoolery »

ricardobeat wrote: post #71
gavanwoolery wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My opinion is that it is kind of a scam. If they can pull it off, I would love to be proven wrong. But so far all they have is a no-name development team that does not even have a website, and it looks like they just used a prefab engine like Unity to produce their demo video. I've developed with voxels for over 10 years...Marching cubes is nothing new (in fact, I "invented" it on my own without knowing that the algo…

Hey, you're the atomontage guy! I'd give you a couple million if I could :) Totally agree. There are many examples of developers who seriously underestimated the costs for a full game. With the influx of projects, I believe some kind of vetoing will have to be implemented for projects >50k.

Thanks, I'm not the Atomontage guy though; his name is Branislav Síleš (although I am a supporter of his project :) ). I built an engine called Genesis in 2004-2006, and since then many unpublished projects (latest at gavanw.com).

$50k is actually a good amount for an independent project...if the team could demonstrate that they can make sufficient progress with that type of funding, it could open the doors to more. Although, since Kickstarter takes 5 percent it wants as much funding to come in as possible.

Re: What the hell these game developers did with your kickstarter money

#73

Post by sukuriant »

phaus wrote: post #23
jay_kyburz wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm in the indie games business and I can say they overpaid for everything. 6K for music should be 1-2k at most! Poster Art - What's wrong with those awesome sprites that Kotaku used. Should be 0. IPads? More that one? PAX East? - That's a holiday not a legitimate business expense. This is why they say so many people don't make their money back in the App Store any more. You can't spend indie money like you work for…

"IPads? More than one?" A better question might be, "iPads? Why are these people soliciting money from people to make an iPad game when they don't have any experience developing for the iPad?"

Theirs broke?

They've done iPhone development?

Re: What the hell these game developers did with your kickstarter money

#74

Post by lusr »

mlguenther wrote: post #65
teamonkey wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kickstarter funds count as earnings.

I'm sorry, but you are wrong, any basic accounting knowledge (I am a CPA) will tell you that income can be recognized when EARNED, not when received. This is something the IRS agrees with. Kickstarter funds have not been earned until the product is delivered

Aside from determining earned vs. received, surely the Kickstarter revenue must still be offset against expenses before tax can be calculated?

Re: What the hell these game developers did with your kickstarter money

#75

Post by skore »

Since they asked for 20k, I have real doubts they made a good business calculation. Especially if they note that "PayPal and Amazon take their portions" - I'm pretty sure that Kickstarter tells you to adjust for that.

Had they received only the 20k that they asked for, they would now (adjusting for less money necessary for rewards etc.) be left with almost no money at all. That's simply not good business calculation.

Re: What the hell these game developers did with your kickstarter money

#77

Post by asynchrony »

danilocampos wrote: post #69
elithrar wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Ahh, gamers, they're so cute. Poorly-informed over-entitled misanthropes, but cute. As a gamer, I completely agree with you here. The entitlement has grown rapidly over the past 2-3 years, and in my opinion is only hurting those in the industry looking to be adventurous. Something like Minecraft might be the exception, but look at the shenanigans surrounding the Mass Effect 3 ending (which was not as bad as some wo…

The Mass Effect 3 ending was shit. Not artistic, not creative. Shit. A piece of storytelling so completely divorced from the previous narrative tapestry as to make even professors of English literature wince with disappointment. Its only explanations are rushed development or a lapse in creative oversight. On top of being shit, it was not at all what was described by the project leads in interviews or in advertising.…

Doesn't it seem slightly bizarre to claim entitlement to an entertainment product? At least as bizarre as lobbying a film maker/author into re-editing some content that was found wanting.

Re: What the hell these game developers did with your kickstarter money

#78

Post by mlguenther »

lusr wrote: post #74
mlguenther wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry, but you are wrong, any basic accounting knowledge (I am a CPA) will tell you that income can be recognized when EARNED, not when received. This is something the IRS agrees with. Kickstarter funds have not been earned until the product is delivered

Aside from determining earned vs. received, surely the Kickstarter revenue must still be offset against expenses before tax can be calculated?

Yes, there are many ways to offset the income with expenses. Though what most Kickstarter video game devs are finding out is that they may not use all of the money as expenses in the first year. If you are accounting on a "cash" system, you would have to pay tax, if you are accounting on an "accrual" system, you would not have to pay tax until the game is released, regardless of how many expenses you have.

Re: What the hell these game developers did with your kickstarter money

#79

Post by danilocampos »

asynchrony wrote: post #77
danilocampos wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Mass Effect 3 ending was shit. Not artistic, not creative. Shit. A piece of storytelling so completely divorced from the previous narrative tapestry as to make even professors of English literature wince with disappointment. Its only explanations are rushed development or a lapse in creative oversight. On top of being shit, it was not at all what was described by the project leads in interviews or in advertising.…

Doesn't it seem slightly bizarre to claim entitlement to an entertainment product? At least as bizarre as lobbying a film maker/author into re-editing some content that was found wanting.

Nope.

I have money.

I give it to you for a product you have promised me, according to certain specifications we have agreed upon.

Here you go.

I am now entitled to the product as described for that money. Mass Effect's epic conclusion was hyped for five years. It was the central selling point of the series. A version of Excel that doesn't calculate things correctly is broken. Similarly, an interactive story that fails to deliver on the promise of complexity and interactivity in its most glorified and advertised of moments is also broken.

Films and books don't belong in this discussion – they are not interactive media. They stand no valuable comparison. This situation is more like a piece of software that ships broken and needs a patch to sort things out. That happens so often as to be unremarkable.

Re: What the hell these game developers did with your kickstarter money

#80

Post by marquis »

jaems33 wrote: post #32
marquis wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>6K for music should be 1-2k at most! For good music? For music that you don't want to turn off the second time you play it? Don't undervalue good production values.

Seriously. Oh development can be 5k and above but something also important like music? Pssh, screw that...

The developers still get to sell their product right? This is a Kickstarter - they get to keep making a profit. If they want to bootstrap then sure, use the most cost effective method but if someone has given you $20k to get a beautiful game made, make that beautiful game. I love good music in my media experiences and I'll pay for those games that have that.
Post reply on HN