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[redhood56]

You got any quotes as to what he said?

Here is the video when he played it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAu8TVJGnS8. But this is when he did convention coverage with the dev so he couldn't really criticize it like he does now. But I remember in one of his mailbox/ama/ videos or soundcloud he talked about it. There are so many of those things, I doubt I could find it.

 

[QuicheFontaine]

Angel Investors are a thing. Kick starter is basically a way to do angel investing with the possibility of some physical reward.

Not really. I've never met an Angel Investor who didn't want equity or at least some kind of bond. They're generally not happy with "the possibility of some physical reward".

 

[Yrael]

My sense would be that while a budgetary breakdown can't plausibly be given at the time, a good rule of thumb is to look at the number of people they purport to have on their team, the amount of months they claim development will take, and the amount of money they're asking for (minus costs of physical reward fulfillment, taxes, KS fees, etc.) And if the napkin math doesn't work out, then don't pledge. The napkin math would not work out in the case of this game, not at all.

I mean, the default should be "I will not pledge". People should be opting in on a very choosy, selective basis. If there are any red flags at all, don't let the people assuage you or smooth it over with a message DURING the Kickstarter, just sit it out. If the product ends up releasing, you can try it then. If the product doesn't get funded, well, you're not to blame--the people pitching the product are for not doing a better pitch.

In the case of the reductio ad absurdum licensing situation, I don't think backers would be hurt by just assuming the license is a major component of the money asked for and then proceed from there by doing the above calculations.

I don't want to take away from the liability of the people selling snake oil. Those people suck, and even if they're coming from ignorance rather than malice, they hurt others and they owe us more responsibility than that. But I'm highly skeptical of outraged and baffled claims by backers who clearly didn't put even 5 seconds of thought into their pledge because they were so wowed by something conceptually or by someone's name that they shut down their mental faculties.

Mmm...I do agree to some extent with this too, despite not being impressed with the terrible way this situation has been handled. People should be a little more selective about the money they pour into Kickstarter projects.

 

[Klyka]

Pretty much most youtubers are just PR companies now. It's super obvious when they are too.

Sad, but fact of life

 

[Fantastapotamus]

Yep, payola is alive and well; now it's just practiced by let's players instead of (well, in addition to) the music industry. I won't watch a Youtuber that tries to strong arm developers into these unfair 'pay to play' tactics, and neither should anyone else.

I wonder if this will open people's eyes a bit. I never quite understood why everybody always thinks that "traditional" media is all corrupt but some guys on Youtube are holy and wouldn't even think to accept money for a their videos.

 

[Saintguine]

This is honestly bad for actually competent indie teams that do actually follow through with releasing a game, teams in the same position as say Torn Banner Studios who made Chivalry: Medieval Warfare on $85,000 may not get funded in the future now due to the immense amount of well deserved skepticism that Kickstarter received.

 

[LurkerPrime]

I saw it mentioned once, but it bears repeating: Yogscast are not only incredibly popular, but are also at the front of a new "partnership" with developers where they cover games (in a totally impartial way not related to their direct profit at all!) in exchange for a percentage of increased games sales in the time following the videos.


They seem real trustworthy though, I'm sure there will be nothing to be concerned about there.

This is terrifying. I really hope it doesn't become something commonplace.

Well, the risk can be minimised if you do a bit of research. If they have a prototype, or past experience, and the project seems viable for their budget then it's less likely to fail. The issue here is, people backed purely on the Yogscast name and the project wasn't even by them. It was by a small development company trying to make something larger than they had the money, resources or manpower for, using their name.

I've backed quite a lot of kickstarters, 35 in total and none of them have failed. The oldest 10 have delivered, and a few of the others have too, the rest have been giving updates. Though I don't really give that much to KS projects, so even if something did fail, I'm not going to cry that much about losing say $20.

Congratulations on having good judgement. Unfortunately, some people don't want to spend hours researching and calculating whether Kickstarter Tier X is the best of investments, and they would rather trust the people behind the Kickstarter. Call them naïve or idealistic if you want, but it's not unreasonable to expect Kickstarter themselves to enforce a gorram ounce of credibility to projects using their service, instead of passing everything through and just collecting the cheques.

And, to be clear, Yogscast licensed their name for the explicit purpose of promoting the Kickstarter, so it isn't just a case of the developer name-dropping for the sake of it. They paid for that privilege, and presumably for Yogscast advertisements of the Kickstarter itself.

If you truly want to avoid risk, just buy the finished project (as Stump suggests).

This is honestly bad for actually competent indie teams that do actually follow through with releasing a game, teams in the same position as say Torn Banner Studios who made Chivalry: Medieval Warfare on $85,000 may not get funded in the future now due to the immense amount of well deserved skepticism.

The Chivalry retail game is made by the same team as the Chivalry source mod, isn't it? I think that would be enough to get people past the trust hurdle.

For completely unproven studios, this will further weaken their credibility... and rightfully so. They're unproven for a reason, and there's no reason to expect otherwise (no matter who's involved) until they actually show what they're capable of.

 

[Klyka]

I wonder if this will open people's eyes a bit. I never quite understood why everybody always thinks that "traditional" media is all corrupt but some guys on Youtube are holy and wouldn't even think to accept money for a their videos.

It's the "one of us" mentality.
They think those people are just like them,just some gamers sitting ther ein their own apartment making videos when in reality those are actual companies with scripts, actors, contracts, etc.... now.
There are seriously people who think that yogscast and pewdiepie and so on are "just some gamer guys"!

 

[crazyrabbits]

I wonder if this will open people's eyes a bit. I never quite understood why everybody always thinks that "traditional" media is all corrupt but some guys on Youtube are holy and wouldn't even think to accept money for a their videos.

The nature of Youtube is that it's still (comparatively) young, and it has never really faced any major blowback from integrated advertising. Besides gaming personalities, there was a whole brouhaha a few years back with a woman named Mia Rose who tried to springboard her career by using fake views/likes, paid advertisements and affiliations with supposedly-unbiased partner channels to springboard her music career.

LP'ing is still a burgeoning industry, but more and more people are jumping on because they've seen the stupid amounts of money commentators can bring in. You work your own hours, are only responsible for creating and uploading your own content, and if you have a network of friends, you can make absurd views by cross-promoting each other.

 

[mclem]

My sense would be that while a budgetary breakdown can't plausibly be given at the time,

Well, I'd hope that they have a reason for picking the target value they do. Presenting how they came to that value would be very useful information for a backer.

And if the napkin math doesn't work out, then don't pledge. The napkin math would not work out in the case of this game, not at all.

Yes, I agree. But if the scope was a game that would be viable for $250k but not for a game that would be viable for $125k, that's where I would take issue.

I mean, the default should be "I will not pledge". People should be opting in on a very choosy, selective basis. If there are any red flags at all, don't let the people assuage you or smooth it over with a message DURING the Kickstarter, just sit it out. If the product ends up releasing, you can try it then. If the product doesn't get funded, well, you're not to blame--the people pitching the product are for not doing a better pitch.

This is a very reasonable approach to take to it, although I would at least give them an opportunity to clear up the red flag; there might be reasonable arguments for it. It's a fair consideration that perhaps they should have presented the initial pitch better, but I don't think it's unreasonable to give them a chance to clarify.

That said, it's absolutely worth being extra wary if it gets to the point where it feels like they're adapting their claims and goals just to please the pledgers. It still could be effective, but that should raise alarm bells. I do still have a little pledger's remorse over Republique, but I take responsibility for that.

I think it'll be slightly different for all backers, but there absolutely should be some cutoff point.

In the case of the reductio ad absurdum licensing situation, I don't think backers would be hurt by just assuming the license is a major component of the money asked for and then proceed from there by doing the above calculations.

Well, I think the key in the Yogventures example is that the amount offered for the license is significantly higher than I was actually imagining. I generally regard myself as quite good at figuring out how much budget should be justified, and I'm rather stunned by the amount that's supposedly gone out for that license.

 

[Willy Wanka]

I don't think this will come as a huge surprise to most people. Considering the lofty design goals outlined in the original pitch, £500K (nevermind half that) seemed like a pretty unrealistic budget for a game of that scope.

 

[Saintguine]

The Chivalry retail game is made by the same team as the Chivalry source mod, isn't it? I think that would be enough to get people past the trust hurdle.

For completely unproven studios, this will further weaken their credibility... and rightfully so. They're unproven for a reason, and there's no reason to expect otherwise (no matter who's involved) until they actually show what they're capable of.

Yeah, and they showed off a feature complete beta with assets that are near-completion I remember. Hopefully, looking at the silver-lining here this makes prospective developers who want to use Kickstarter actually show off in-game footage that is to a reasonable standard to earn people's trust.

 

[Suzushiiro]

As a general rule, don't back a kickstarter unless:

A) The group in question has delivered a product on that scale before, or
B) You're okay with getting absolutely nothing back for your money.

 

[Spring-Loaded]

As a general rule, don't back a kickstarter unless:

A) The group in question has delivered a product on that scale before, or
B) You're okay with getting absolutely nothing back for your money.

The developers having something to show is helpful too. If you're willing to pay for what they already have running, there's considerably less chance of getting nothing out of it.

 

[Aaron]

As a general rule, don't back a kickstarter unless:

A) The group in question has delivered a product on that scale before, or
B) You're okay with getting absolutely nothing back for your money.

Yeah. I've backed some new devs that have yet to ship the game, and even though they had working prototypes, I can accept if those projects never come out.

 

[mclem]

Having millions of people following you and making tons of money while everyone tells you how amazing you are can do that to people.

There's a British gameshow host - Bruce Forsyth - who had a catch phrase "And what do points mean?" (Audience: "PRIZES!"). Satirical panel show, I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue riffed on this:

Humph (Host): "And what do points mean?"
Audience: "PRIZES!"
Humph: "...now go and invade Poland"

 

[jett]

For every Shovel Knight, there are like 10 douchebags.

 

[Krakn3Dfx]

That gif is amazing.



That's the sort of attitude that lead to this Yogsventure to begin with. The developers partnered with the Yogscast (so they would lend their name to the project) for "only" half of the money raised. It was purely a PR move to gain more support for the Kickstarter - and it worked, as they more than doubled their ask. The fact that it was a risky thing to support was trumped by the big name attached to it; every fan would go "I trust the Yogscast" and pledge their support, regardless of the pie-in-the-sky goals of the sinister six development team.

Big names mean big results... But at least this has been a Yogsventure we'll never forget.

I think Youtubers hooking up with a questionable development house for a Kickstarter is quite a bit different than seasoned developers like Crate (formerly Iron Lore), inXile (headed by Brian Fargo, the founder of Interplay and creator of the original Wasteland), or Obsidian Entertainment, who has made several amazing titles. These are studios that have the management and development experience to know what it costs to make a game and have produced thousands of hours of content for gamers in the past.

For every Shovel Knight, there are like 10 douchebags.

On the plus side, Shovel Knight is totally worth putting up with 10 douchebags.

 

[RiggyRob]

I'm pretty sure he made a video or podcast about the discovery thing being a bad idea and bad for everyone but the youtube personality. If I remember right, he pointed out flaws with the system and some other stuff.

Edit: https://soundcloud.com/totalbiscuit/yogola-nope-thats-the-cleverest-title-i-can-come-up-with

Here is the video when he played it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAu8TVJGnS8. But this is when he did convention coverage with the dev so he couldn't really criticize it like he does now. But I remember in one of his mailbox/ama/ videos or soundcloud he talked about it. There are so many of those things, I doubt I could find it.

Cheers for these, but I am getting the impression that he's being soft on the Yogscast because he's friends with them. Still, props to TB, he's called them out on it - let's see if he does the same with this.

 

[mclem]

As a general rule, don't back a kickstarter unless:

A) The group in question has delivered a product on that scale before, or
B) You're okay with getting absolutely nothing back for your money.

I'd also say: Consider the amount you back with care. You don't have to back a given amount, so consider carefully how much you'll offer, what rewards you get, and how viable you think it is. I'm a lot more open-minded and risk-friendly when I'm considering $10 than when I'm considering >$100, and that's fine with me.

 

[Timeaisis]

Ugh. Another one down.

To those asking "Why can't they just refund the money?" Well, because they already spent it on Winterkewl Games' operating costs.

 

[blastprocessor]

I just can't believe what i'm reading. You trust these people to deliver and this is what happens. Blaming the project on management is just laughable. Glad l don't bother with Kickstarter.

 

[mclem]

For every Shovel Knight, there are like 10 douchebags.

Ironically: The Order of No Quarter, The Sorceress, The Black Knight: Exactly 10 people of various douchbagginess. It works!

 

[Hellsing321]

This is why you should look at the reputation of the people when funding a kick starter as well as the scope.

After everything I'm learning about these Yogscast guys I'm shocked that they have as big a following as they do. Seem like the some of the scummiest guys on YouTube.

 

[NewEraBlood]

If someone is wondering how far they got with the game then here's the most recent dev log showing footage of the game. From February.

I could have made that in Project Spark or Kodu Game Lab in an hour and I have no programming experience outside of visual basic. That is pathetic.

 

[stevil]

Here is the video when he played it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAu8TVJGnS8. But this is when he did convention coverage with the dev so he couldn't really criticize it like he does now. But I remember in one of his mailbox/ama/ videos or soundcloud he talked about it. There are so many of those things, I doubt I could find it.

wow that's a telling video, they didn't think beyond the concept and even didn't think about how the game mechanics would work.

 

[Krejlooc]

For every Shovel Knight, there are like 10 douchebags.

Thats true of everything in gaming. The sheer number of stuff that comes out every year insures that the ratio of good to crap is always heavy in favor of the crap.

 

[loaf of bread]

I don't think people should be attacking yogscast because the kickstarted project fell through. Yes they need to do something appropriate for the backers and i'm sure they will. They've raised over 1.5 million dollars for charities in the past 3 years alone they don't deserve to be called scam artists and assholes because they were in over their heads on this project.

 

[dimb]

This is why you should look at the reputation of the people when funding a kick starter as well as the scope.

I would guess most people donating see the Yogscast as public figures they think they know. The idea that people who regularly interact with their own community would basically just take a bunch of money from fans and walk away is kind of unthinkable.

 

[mattiewheels]

If it's true that the Yogcast people got to take half of the 500k just for name and likeness rights, free and clear with nothing to fund, then what can't they institute some kind of refund plan with that? Or do they feel fine keeping literally dirty money?

 

[EmiPrime]

If it's true that the Yogcast people got to take half of the 500k just for name and likeness rights, free and clear with nothing to fund, then what can't they institute some kind of refund plan with that? Or do they feel fine keeping literally dirty money?

They think they are untouchable.

 

[ultron87]

Ugh. Another one down.

To those asking "Why can't they just refund the money?" Well, because they already spent it on Winterkewl Games' operating costs.

I expect the Yogscast people actually could afford to refund the money if they really did feel indebted to their fans for slapping their name on this thing. Especially if they did indeed take half the Kickstarter money for the use of their name.

But nope, everyone should be happy with a 10 dollar Steam game.

 

[Myggen]

This is why you should look at the reputation of the people when funding a kick starter as well as the scope.

After everything I'm learning about these Yogscast guys I'm shocked that they have as big a following as they do. Seem like the some of the scummiest guys on YouTube.

You should, but most people who donate to these kinds of projects are just fans of the guys behind them, and will automatically trust them because of it. That's why Kickstarter should have at least some quality control before they let a potential project in. You might say "tough shit" to the people who donate before doing any research, but it should also be up to Kickstarter to secure that the most unrealistic projects can't get that far.

I don't think people should be attacking yogscast because the kickstarted project fell through. Yes they need to do something appropriate for the backers and i'm sure they will. They've raised over 1.5 million dollars for charities in the past 3 years alone they don't deserve to be called scam artists and assholes because they were in over their heads on this project.

I wouldn't go so far as saying they're scam artists. That implies intent to decieve, which I doubt they had. BUT they supported a project that it's obvious would never, ever get made, or at least not to the standard they promised (those dev diary videos on YT are absolutely pathetic). That should earn you a bunch of criticism. That they've raised money for charity is a good thing, but entirely irrelevant here. The whole Yogsdiscorvery thing is also payola at its absolute worst, but that's for another discussion.

 

[Labadal]

Nah, I'll just buy the finished project when it releases IF it looks like it's worthy of a purchase. I work too hard for my money to gamble it away on someone maybe following through on a making something I may or may not like.

If that is how you feel, then fair enough.

I'm happy with what I have backed, that is all I can say.

 

[freenudemacusers]

seems like a better investment would be 10k at a casino table.

 

[Aquamarine]

Were they the guys who claimed that minecraft's success was because of them?

Yep. They have quite a large ego. And quite greedy as well if we believe they squandered half of the Kickstarter revenue.

 

[LurkerPrime]

I think Youtubers hooking up with a questionable development house for a Kickstarter is quite a bit different than seasoned developers like Crate (formerly Iron Lore), inXile (headed by Brian Fargo, the founder of Interplay and creator of the original Wasteland), or Obsidian Entertainment, who has made several amazing titles. These are studios that have the management and development experience to know what it costs to make a game and have produced thousands of hours of content for gamers in the past.

Yes, I agree.

Established development houses have the best chances of being Kickstarter successes, but it doesn't gaurantee their projects will go down without a hitch. [Insert a nod/glance to Double Fine Productions here.]

With the success of Divinity: Original Sin and FTL (probably others as well), it seems to me that using Kickstarter for the final stretch of development (rather than full development) is the best way to do it. It is the most fair to the potential Kickstarters, as they can be given a good idea of what the game is and what they'll be getting. This approach would avoid any more Yogsventures in the future.

 

[loaf of bread]

Yep. They have quite a large ego. And quite greedy as well if we believe they squandered half of the Kickstarter revenue.

That minecraft rumor was proven untrue that they ever said that.

When have Yogscast ever ended up in the gaming news cycle for something positive?

Donating millions of dollars to charity.

 

[BobTheFork]

I remember when KS started to get big, I thought it was really poor for companies like Double Fine or a person like Molyneaux to leverage KS because they are established and should have other means. Obviously though, they have the greatest ability to plan, scope and finish a project. KS turned into this 'great' way for people to get games funded without having to get jobs in games companies, which can be a horrible grind.

Well go figure the upstarts are FAR less experienced with planning, scope and finishing projects. It really says something when you get twice what you though you needed and come up with nothing to show for it. Either there are some serious lessons about software development they needed to learn or it's just a way of scamming money.

 

[Aquamarine]

That minecraft rumor was proven untrue that they ever said that.

Wasn't it Notch who told us that they were being assholes at MineCon?

 

[loaf of bread]

Wasn't it Notch who was telling us that they were being assholes at MineCon?

Yes and it was confirmed that what he said wasn't very true by him himself included. Notch has been known to be a big drama queen especially on twitter where this whole thing went down.

 

[Rapstah]

If it's true that the Yogcast people got to take half of the 500k just for name and likeness rights, free and clear with nothing to fund, then what can't they institute some kind of refund plan with that? Or do they feel fine keeping literally dirty money?

If they spent it, then holy shit was this a bad deal by the developer, because that means they funding for the tier bonuses was supposed to come from the money the game was going to eventually earn them.

 

[Corto]

I'll be sure to remember all this guys names for personal future reference. Shameless.

 

[Rapstah]

Donating millions of dollars to charity.

That's never ended up in the parts of the gaming news cycle I read.

 

[mclem]

Thats true of everything in gaming. The sheer number of stuff that comes out every year insures that the ratio of good to crap is always heavy in favor of the crap.

Sturgeon's Law. It doesn't just apply to gaming!

 

[rpmurphy]

That's a common high-end reward though - just look at this from the Mighty No. 9 Kickstarter:

Fair enough, the one above includes all rewards below that tier in the Mighty No. 9 Kickstarter, but still, it's the same idea.

Dinner is one step better, but still it's silly to me. And travel and lodging not being included in that one... lol ok. I honestly wonder who the target audience is for that tier.

 

[Rapstah]

Back in June 2013, Winterkewl games claimed the backer rewards were entirely in the hands of the Yogscast people:

Hi Joe, The Yogscast are actually designing, producing, and shipping the physical rewards themselves. They have the experience with those kinds of products so they are in charge of the physical rewards. We don't have an ETA from them quite yet, but they are working hard to get everything ready at once so we can minimize the costs of shipping and avoid shipping to the same person more than once. We will also be asking everyone receiving a physical reward to provide us with an updated mailing address when the time comes to begin shipping. The servers aren't all setup yet, but when they are you'll be able to create an account and enter your information there. If you have any further questions The Yogscast have setup a separate email address exclusively for physical reward questions which is : yogventures@yogscast.com Sorry for the delay, and thanks for your patience!

The reason their game looks like a quick Unity tech demo is apparently because it was a quick Unity tech demo:

The funny thing is, that the rest of the systems are actually much easier and less time consuming to implement due largely to the fact that we made the decision early on to use the Unity engine. As a result much of the remaining systems are already well along, it's just that without a working procedural sandbox the rest wouldn't work. That's the main reason I'm so optimistic for the future of Yogventures, now that our custom hybrid procedural voxel terrain generation engine is nearing optimal performance. Things like multiplayer and map making, crafting, dialog branching, AI etc all of these other systems we've either already implemented before or there are a lot of examples and existing API's to aid in development. The one thing I will say is that there will never be a time when we simply throw in the towel. We're in this until Yogventures delivers on everything we want it to. Thanks!

 

[LurkerPrime]

Back in June 2013, Winterkewl games claimed the backer rewards were entirely in the hands of the Yogscast people:

The reason their game looks like a quick Unity tech demo is apparently because it was a quick Unity tech demo:

So this is basically what the Areal Kickstarter will look like if it somehow managed to succeed?

I don't know how to feel about that.

 

[jimmypop]

yogscast is the same youtube channel that just announced yogsdiscovery

ie they cover your game on youtube, then they get a percentage of their sales when the game starts selling more

smh

What? That's gross. Some days, I hate the internet.

 

[Timeaisis]

I expect the Yogscast people actually could afford to refund the money if they really did feel indebted to their fans for slapping their name on this thing. Especially if they did indeed take half the Kickstarter money for the use of their name.

But nope, everyone should be happy with a 10 dollar Steam game.

I'll be the first to admit I have no idea about Yogcast, and I'm not defending them in the least. I'm just saying when people ask for money back at the end of a failed kickstarter it's very likley that this is impossible because the fundees went and spent it all.

In the matter of Yogcast, if you are right they do have that money, they should refund it as a gesture of good faith. As far as the game developer is concerned, I can almost guarantee you that it's all been spent (at least their half, anyway).