Broken Age - Double Fine Adventure!

[elmuerte]

Top right corner, at the bottom of the list

 

Yep, that's right. Wizard world

[Kindness]

Actually, #6 appears to be DRM.

[I_smell]

Personally, as a person playing, I don't care I'll just play it later. I'm mostly here for the documentary anyway (not watched this one yet)

 

It's a shame that the story of DoubleFine circumventing publishers, and kickstarting a huge new way of making games like this is such a fuckin rocky road though. If this is a test-case, or a poster-child or a yard-stick of this style of business then I guess the result aint all fun in the sun, and it'll probably be right back to publisher-or-no-game soon*. It must be tense for the people there, cos of course they know that all eyes are on them on this one.

 

Fun trivia: I did this exact thing with my Kickstarter in 2011. I released the game, then updated it with about the same amount of content a couple months later. Ya gotta do it.

Also fun trivia, when I said I wanted to avoid a second kickstarter to raise funds, I ALSO landed on Steam Early Access and that's where the current project's going.

 

*for this size of team

[lobotomy42]

I certainly wouldn't want Tim to compromise his vision if he can figure out a way of making it happen in a realistic manner, which is why my above thing doesn't actually bother me.  But at the same time I hope he learns from this experience so he's not forced into this situation again.

 

Here's the thing, though: artistic visions are not permanent fixed decrees delivered to man from God in pure form. This kickstarter, more than any of the other big game projects, was the least defined at the beginning, so in that respect Tim actually had more flexibility to come up with a vision to match the scope of the project than many others.  As we've seen in the documentaries thus far, Tim has resisted at least a few attempts from other team members to start limiting the project.  (I haven't watched the most recent one yet, but I'm assuming the trend continues.) So I don't think it's totally fair to just laugh at the "nerd rage" of people disappointed in scope creep.  This isn't a personal attack on Tim or any member of Double Fine, just an honest expression of disappointment.

 

As with many in this thread, it's no particular skin off my nose, but if I were someone more personally invested in this project, then perhaps it might be.

[Roderick]

For some bizarre reason, I've not been watching any of the documentary episodes. I think I've seen the first one. I was excited and everything, but then the whole 'don't show me how the bread is baked, I just want to play the finished game' kicked in. Now I've come so far I just want to play the game whenever it comes out (I'm in no rush) and then afterwards I'll watch the making of.

 

Is that crazy? I just feel I wouldn't be able to enjoy the game in a certain virgin way if I saw beforehand how it was all made. I'd be looking at the game from an appreciative standpoint more than a player's.

 

As a result, I can't say anything about choices made about the game's scope. The only thing I can say that there is a ton of pressure for this project to deliver, since it's become the Kickstarter golden child.

[Thrik]

That's exactly what I'm doing. I'm sure I'm missing out a little by not being part of the emotional roller coaster as it happens, but I'll still have a splendid behind-the-scenes video series to enjoy after I've played the game that'll go into far more detail and have better production values than most.

[Tanukitsune]

I refuse to watch the videos until I play the game, I like to watch the "extras" after watching the "movie" and not the other way around if that makes any sense.

[Joewintergreen]

They are careful not to spoil, but I guess if you want to know literally nothing about the game that's probably a good idea

[Ben X]

I was tempted to do that, but I decided that as part of the conception behind this was that it would be an inclusive process and something different to normal development, I'd go along with that and not worry as much as usual about location/character etc spoilers.

 

In the latest doc episode there's a line from Tim about how he feels you need a certain size of game to create a puzzle space, and then adds the proviso "at least for me" (I may be paraphrasing there).

[toblix]

I really recommend watching the episodes as they come out. They're intentionally avoiding story details, spoiling literally nothing – certainly less than your average game marketing. The main focus is the people (some great portrait episodes not about the game at all) and the process.

 

WATCH IT !!!

[Roderick]

That's a sterling endorsement there, Toblix. Consider it considered!

[elmuerte]

Wait, they are actually making a game to release? I thought they just did it in order to create the documentary.

[I_smell]

Watching the doc later is totally fine. I don't bother looking up movie trailers or reviews any more just cos movies usually spend the first 20-30 minutes setting up the characters and intent of the world much better than some guy on Youtube will. Everything's usually better when you don't know what you're in for.

 

By that same token though, watching the documentary is especially exciting because I don't know how the game's gonna come out. We don't know the ending to this story yet! THAT experience would be diluted after the game's already done. Watching the scenes where they come up with the name and character design will be totally different after you've played the game, cos you'll already know where those conversations end up.

I'm not even super into adventure games, so I'm definitely watching the doc first.

 

EDIT- Watching the episode now, I'm so glad to see that the people in Double Fine are split on whether or not to chop the game in half. That's totally something you never see, but it feels like it happens all the time, so this scene is perfect. I did wanna see the conversation about whether or not they should do a 2nd kickstarter, but this is fine.

And so unbelievably perfect that his mechanic said "It's hard to know where to stop on a project like yours."

[syntheticgerbil]

Yeah, I got a super long e-mail update yesterday from the Banner Saga folks pretty much telling people that this is what happens in game development all the time, but Double Fine is showing it warts and all. I think it was also a reply to them being lumped in with Double Fine with Kickstarter being some kind of risky failure for all games because of project delays.

[osmosisch]

For some bizarre reason, I've not been watching any of the documentary episodes. I think I've seen the first one. I was excited and everything, but then the whole 'don't show me how the bread is baked, I just want to play the finished game' kicked in. Now I've come so far I just want to play the game whenever it comes out (I'm in no rush) and then afterwards I'll watch the making of.

 

Is that crazy? I just feel I wouldn't be able to enjoy the game in a certain virgin way if I saw beforehand how it was all made. I'd be looking at the game from an appreciative standpoint more than a player's.

 

As a result, I can't say anything about choices made about the game's scope. The only thing I can say that there is a ton of pressure for this project to deliver, since it's become the Kickstarter golden child.

I am in 100% the same place actually. I was also feeling weird about it, but I'm intending to only watch the documentary once the game is out.

[thestalkinghead]

as a slacker backer i am obviously totally fine with people buying early access, kickstarter isn't a club membership it is a way of getting funding for the game, i don't think people complained about them selling the game on their web site or on the humble bundle so maybe people are complaining about it being on steam, or maybe it is because they are going to split the game, i can't say for a fact but i would imagine the reason they want it on steam is because it will generate lots of sales (more than their website) because steam has lots of users and the reason for the split is because the game needs to be playable to be on early access and/or playable games are more likely to sell because you get instant gratification for your purchase, the game seems like it will be released as a finished(or at least extremely close to finished) first act so it will be in better shape than a lot of early access games, and obviously you have the choice to not play it until the final release if you want to but maybe that temptation is annoying people, but basically it just seems like what happened was that plans changed and the equals internet outrage 

[lobotomy42]

After watching the video, the situation seems even more ambiguous.

 

So, despite all this talk of the need to release something imminently, the "Part 1" isn't coming until January? And then Part 2 is just three months later, in April? So the issue is, they needed three months worth' of additional funding?

 

It's also not totally clear on what this split means for the game itself.  Part 1 is being simultaneously described as "the first half" of a two-part game (like a miniature episodic series) but also as a "pre-release" (as in "Here's what we've got so far, let us know what you think!") I guess this matters more for branding than in practice, but it definitely muddles the sense of what the game actually is.  Is it a two-part game, the first part of which is released in January, or is it one single game, which will have an incomplete "preview" available in January? Answering this probably doesn't matter in practice, but it does affect, for me, weirdly, whether I will want to play the stand-alone part 1 when it releases or wait for the entire thing.

 

Also, not to be a back-seat driver, but I'm worried that selling this pre-release on Steam will not bring in as much revenue as they're hoping.  But presumably they are better at predicting that number than I am.

[thestalkinghead]

it seems to me like it will be the finished first half of a full game that isn't episodic released on early access, if they sell it for $30 they only have to sell 100,000 to make $3,000,000 and there must be a few hundred thousand that would buy the game but haven't yet and of those people there should be enough that buy it not finished a few months early 

[BigJKO]

It's definitely a finished, polished first half of the game in January, according to Tim's note. And some months later an update, with the second half.

[MrHoatzin]

I would imagine they plan to throw a lot more people into the late production in January and roll through the rest of the production in a couple of months finishing the remaining 75% of the game thusly. Whatever gets released early I hope will be a vertical slice down the first acts of both the kids (in some kind of 1/2 of Something Great Pseudo Alpha Build), rather than full act of either one of them (as Part 1).

 

I also hope that the 2PP peeps have some kind of flexible scope creep contract that allows them to be paid for the extra filming protracted production incurs. The behind-the-scenes soap opera has been a super important winning-the-hearts-and-minds PR without which this constant reaching for fans' pockets wouldn't work as effectively. I hope this DF/2PP symbiosis is something that continues for other projects past Massive Chalice and Broken Age.

 

Personally, I wish there was a way to buy more backer t-shirts. I was poor when the Kickstarter kicked off and have wished I had a way to re-extend my support here in the later days but with some kind of trophy in return (that is not a poster).

[Dewar]

I'd also imagine that a lot of the development time has gone into the engine and such, leaving mainly the art team to finish up work on the second half one the first half ships.

[lobotomy42]

I'd also imagine that a lot of the development time has gone into the engine and such, leaving mainly the art team to finish up work on the second half one the first half ships.

 

Sure.  My question wasn't "Why is there such a disparity in development time between the halves?" as much as it was "Why do all this if it only buys you three months of development time?"  I'm just trying to imagine what their financial situation could be such that they need some money RIGHT NOW (in January) instead of RIGHT NOW (in April.)  Unless they're planning for people who buy the pre-release/part-one/whatever to pay for the game twice, then all they've really done is time-shift some of the potential game sales forward a few months, right?

 

Put another way: if they think that game sales will pay for development costs, just not soon enough, then why not just take out a three-month loan?  And if they DON'T think game sales will pay for development costs, then what does this change do to solve it?

 

Put another way: I am not a businessman.

[Dewar]

Oh, I see what you're saying. That's a very good question.

[brkl]

If game developers could just walk into a bank and loan 3 million dollars, the industry would look quite different. There are institutions that do that and they're called publishers, who you pay back with your share of the money from sales.

[thestalkinghead]

also the point is that they want the game to be totally funded independently they don't want to crack at the final hurdle and get publisher/investor money