Formula Fusion (futuristic racer by former Wipeout devs) Kickstarter is up

The teaser they released some time ago looked slow and bad (they're basically modified F1 cars that fly), so I'm not really interested. Make it look cool AND fast please.

The vehicles in the video look a lot more "wipeout-ish". There wasnt gameplay footage but it definitely looked like a renamed wipeout game.
 
Pretty sure they are on good terms and the fact that they're releasing it on Vita potentially is going to make Sony very happy.

I hope they're on good terms and Sony has no intention of putting out a Wipeout soon so they can actually make it. Skeptic in me was having some worrying thoughts about the stretch goals and wipeout similarities.

I'll definitely back this at some level, I think I have to. Especially with the quote from chrominance's post:

For £35,000, we promise to deliver both the early access track through Steam Early Access and the base game featuring eight tracks in Q1-2 next year.

The current goal implies something else completely.

They also heavily lean on wipeout in the descriptions, not just the similarities you see in the trailer, too heavy for comfort anyway, hopefully they'll be alright.

I really can't see Sony being that childish about it.

They'd be protecting their IP, I don't think it'd be shocking to see it happen (worst case trying to shut down the project, not just stopping it from coming to playstation).

Hopefully they can't just call dibs on awesome futuristic racers but I wouldn't be surprised if they tried it or looked into it.
 
I hope this works. Maybe a plan B would be Sony picking up the tab and rebranding the whole thing as a new Wipeout ;P
 
$30 is a bit much to back something like this, especially considering their extremely low goal. If it takes off and they meet their loftier goals I might bite but for now I think I'll pass.
 
I'm a huge Wipeout fan but there are two problems I see here. Why does none of the rewards include the potential console version? Also making the console stretch goal such a late goal seems ill conceived considering Wipeout was always primarily a console game.

the best hope we can have is too back this, see it coming in early acess, picking up a bit on Steam, then getting picked up by Yoshida's team and ported over PS4 (or Xbox) at some point.

it's a 30$ buck risk to take.

to me, I'll gladly take that risk. It's the last chance at wipeout we got
 
I'd maybe back it if there were a Wii U version possible. It'd be kind of cool to see a Wipe out successor filling the FZero hole. I'll buy it regardless of platform if they can get it to release.
 
An "At £35,000, We Take Your Money" Kickstarter seems kind of iffy to me, especially when the "stretch goal" to actually make a game is 5 times that amount. The fact that they have another "stretch goal" between their funding goal and the actual amount where they make a game is even worse.

As much as I like this type of game, this should not be allowed to happen on Kickstarter. This pretty much falls under their "Contests, coupons, gambling, and raffles" section of things that are prohibited on KS.
 
I loved wipeout but that goal structure just seems wrong. "Actually release the game" as a stretch goal? No, thanks.
 
It seems like that £35k is to fund a 1 track vertical slice, and then rely on Steam Early Access sales to secure additional funding if the KS falls through.
 
Warning - Long message:

This is Andrew Walker, CEO of R8 Games. First of all – thanks for all the interest, it’s great that you are passionate about AG Racing and hopefully we can do something special for you.

Let me try and address your worries about the low goal and explain a few things about our motivating factors.

About the low pledge goal: Is it low? I guess it may seem low when you look at standard studio costs of a ‘FULL’ development. But we all know, the standard studio model is different for ‘indie’s’. We have grown up with this, we have lived and breathed the project for about a year now (off-and-on, playing with ideas and concepts), we understand the demands and the directors are all prepared to work for free calling in favours and even invested our own money - £30k so far btw. We understand the risks and everything has been carefully considered.

This started out as a bit of a pet project and then grew because of the interest we started to get and our confidence grew with the interest. But commercially we needed to try and outline a plan and get cash to get this to the next stage. Early on we approached Debt Funders, Publishers and investors; plans and costings were drawn up/ changed weekly, business plans had to be scrapped and ambitions needed to be trimmed. The difficulty we had was that everyone loved the idea but they would lead us along until the final moment when they would reveal that they wanted to own the IP or need guarantees; creating hoops for us to jump through for very little money.

It became clear very early on that they wanted facts and figures to sign off on cash and ALL of them wanted Kickstarter as a means of validating it on a commercial level. Kickstarter is not something to be taken lightly however and we have been through enough pain to get to where we are right now to just throw it away with some knee jerk reaction. Ask for too much and we are greedy, ask for too little and we are unrealistic, either way it can make or break a concept and thankfully the rules have been tightened up to stop people taking advance of good people – so we are well aware of the risks and what we need to do to make it work. We toyed with doing one in

November/December last year – this was in fact as a result of all the pressure we had been getting to pay people, but it was too early. One publisher took us right through to commercial agreement stage wanting us to do Kickstarter as a means of setting out a KPI – but they still wanted the IP and offered very little money, keeping us dangling on a string. It was a nervy time and it very nearly broke us to be honest, but we decided, ‘screw it’, in the face of no real options we decided to try to hammer this out ourselves – why not go through a bit more pain to push the project a bit further? I am being honest when I say it was one of the scariest decisions I had to make – to try and go it alone.
We created the TPP to grow the community and we created a mechanism to pay for our expenses and basic equipment; but in reality it was still not enough to make any progress or give up our day jobs. But we created a great network and rewarded the people that chose to become engaged and showed faith early on. We worked weekends and nights and early to try and keep on top of things, this is where we are now.

To try and get the information we needed to attract publishers/investors/debt funders we submitted the ‘concept’ onto Steam – the response was incredible by the way – but it was still not enough data to pry money from risk averse investors even though we are in the top 1% of all concept on there.
It was great to talk to Ian Anderson about this and our struggles and he never gave up his faith in us and what we were trying to achieve. We have both been dealt big blows commercially in the past and we know the risks. He appreciates our commitment and in return we have forged a very strong relationship – brothers in arms so to speak. We know what we can do but it’s very hard these days to get anywhere. Even if you are decent people with honourable goals - people will always challenge you and throw obstacles in your way.

So – why 35k? Well, we ‘have’ commercial interest in this, and as a base line we need to prove the concept – but we also need to make sure we can grow the interest as a minimum to gain the exposure we so badly need. Whether that means putting it through steam early access with a partner after Kickstarter, asking for an advance from a publisher, or – subject to interest – keep going on our own. We will protect the game and our promise to you. Holding on to the crown jewels is important to us so we don’t want to go with the publisher option btw.

£35k gives us options and it gives us control. We can do a lot with that money including creating a proof of concept to gain team and craft sponsorship (we have some great options in this area). We would also have merchandising and we would also have early access sales and any other money we can generate. All of this money would be re-invested to give us more commercial options to expand the scope.
The short answer is – it is an amount of money we need to give us the options and ammunition we need to light the commercial fire and secure it’s future. Have we considered everything? Hell yes!

Please get behind what we are trying to do – which is to bring back a genre that means a lot to many people. I have learnt a lot during this journey so far. Let your work do the talking and keep pushing forward. That’s when doors open and dreams are made.
Have some faith – we know what we are doing. We will try to clear things up on Kickstarter tomorrow. Your feedback has been great.

Cheers,
Andrew.
 
As a Wipeout maniac I'm very, very tempted to back heavily (and get my name in the credits), but I have no PC and only really want a console or Vita version. I wish they'd promise one or the other (or both), which have hosted Wipeout games before, rather than PC, which has never been famous for Wipeout.

I agree, if there had PS4 version at top then it could have gain some momentum from Wipeout Fans but for PC release they wont be supporting much. Look at Amplitude funding which was only PS3/PS4.
 
Warning - Long message:

This is Andrew Walker, CEO of R8 Games. First of all – thanks for all the interest, it’s great that you are passionate about AG Racing and hopefully we can do something special for you.

Let me try and address your worries about the low goal and explain a few things about our motivating factors.

About the low pledge goal: Is it low? I guess it may seem low when you look at standard studio costs of a ‘FULL’ development. But we all know, the standard studio model is different for ‘indie’s’. We have grown up with this, we have lived and breathed the project for about a year now (off-and-on, playing with ideas and concepts), we understand the demands and the directors are all prepared to work for free calling in favours and even invested our own money - £30k so far btw. We understand the risks and everything has been carefully considered.

This started out as a bit of a pet project and then grew because of the interest we started to get and our confidence grew with the interest. But commercially we needed to try and outline a plan and get cash to get this to the next stage. Early on we approached Debt Funders, Publishers and investors; plans and costings were drawn up/ changed weekly, business plans had to be scrapped and ambitions needed to be trimmed. The difficulty we had was that everyone loved the idea but they would lead us along until the final moment when they would reveal that they wanted to own the IP or need guarantees; creating hoops for us to jump through for very little money.

It became clear very early on that they wanted facts and figures to sign off on cash and ALL of them wanted Kickstarter as a means of validating it on a commercial level. Kickstarter is not something to be taken lightly however and we have been through enough pain to get to where we are right now to just throw it away with some knee jerk reaction. Ask for too much and we are greedy, ask for too little and we are unrealistic, either way it can make or break a concept and thankfully the rules have been tightened up to stop people taking advance of good people – so we are well aware of the risks and what we need to do to make it work. We toyed with doing one in

November/December last year – this was in fact as a result of all the pressure we had been getting to pay people, but it was too early. One publisher took us right through to commercial agreement stage wanting us to do Kickstarter as a means of setting out a KPI – but they still wanted the IP and offered very little money, keeping us dangling on a string. It was a nervy time and it very nearly broke us to be honest, but we decided, ‘screw it’, in the face of no real options we decided to try to hammer this out ourselves – why not go through a bit more pain to push the project a bit further? I am being honest when I say it was one of the scariest decisions I had to make – to try and go it alone.
We created the TPP to grow the community and we created a mechanism to pay for our expenses and basic equipment; but in reality it was still not enough to make any progress or give up our day jobs. But we created a great network and rewarded the people that chose to become engaged and showed faith early on. We worked weekends and nights and early to try and keep on top of things, this is where we are now.

To try and get the information we needed to attract publishers/investors/debt funders we submitted the ‘concept’ onto Steam – the response was incredible by the way – but it was still not enough data to pry money from risk averse investors even though we are in the top 1% of all concept on there.
It was great to talk to Ian Anderson about this and our struggles and he never gave up his faith in us and what we were trying to achieve. We have both been dealt big blows commercially in the past and we know the risks. He appreciates our commitment and in return we have forged a very strong relationship – brothers in arms so to speak. We know what we can do but it’s very hard these days to get anywhere. Even if you are decent people with honourable goals - people will always challenge you and throw obstacles in your way.

So – why 35k? Well, we ‘have’ commercial interest in this, and as a base line we need to prove the concept – but we also need to make sure we can grow the interest as a minimum to gain the exposure we so badly need. Whether that means putting it through steam early access with a partner after Kickstarter, asking for an advance from a publisher, or – subject to interest – keep going on our own. We will protect the game and our promise to you. Holding on to the crown jewels is important to us so we don’t want to go with the publisher option btw.

£35k gives us options and it gives us control. We can do a lot with that money including creating a proof of concept to gain team and craft sponsorship (we have some great options in this area). We would also have merchandising and we would also have early access sales and any other money we can generate. All of this money would be re-invested to give us more commercial options to expand the scope.
The short answer is – it is an amount of money we need to give us the options and ammunition we need to light the commercial fire and secure it’s future. Have we considered everything? Hell yes!

Please get behind what we are trying to do – which is to bring back a genre that means a lot to many people. I have learnt a lot during this journey so far. Let your work do the talking and keep pushing forward. That’s when doors open and dreams are made.
Have some faith – we know what we are doing. We will try to clear things up on Kickstarter tomorrow. Your feedback has been great.

Cheers,
Andrew.

Welcome to the mad house! Check your FB messages btw.....Need to know what your doing.
 
Looking at the tiers I'm not exactly happy with the lack of a game in it.
Toejam and earl I got the game and a mug, keychain poster etc for the equivalent of £25.

I expect to get the game and some merchandise thats physical for £40... Bit most seems to be everything but the game.

I am going to sit this out. I would love a New. Futuristic racer especially from the creators of wip3out but I think it's a risk their original goal doesn't include making the game.

In fact reading that message above I think I will study it a bit more and wait to see how it progresses and back it nearer the end.
 
Andrew, thanks for the frank post. So the 35k is really a minimum seeding capital that - worst case - lets you get something out on steam early access and the opportunity for that to bring in more funds to help you keep going towards the full game, along with a proof of concept to help get potential external funding.

So that doesn't guarantee we'll get a full game, but it is the best way to give yourself a chance, should kickstarter not be able to fully fund the entire game?

That sounds reasonable to me. My only issue is that I don't want to olay it on a PC :). Do you think,nic you hit your stretch goals,there will be an opportunity for people to switch their PC download for a console one? Possibly with some extra money on top if license fees are an issue?
 
It's weird and almost paradoxical given the fact that The Designers Republic is involved, but i'm not liking it that much visually. :/
 
For so long people here have been clamouring for a new Wipeout style game.

Now a spiritual successor developed by ex wipeout team, with many partnerships the original game has is on kickstarter right now and this is the reaction?

Sorry, I know there are a few challenges as a backer. But 'sitting it out' means bye bye for the game.

Essentially I'm just a little suprised at how fast hype deflated!
 
I signed for the Test Pilot Program, I usually don't like kickstarter things but I was convinced to help this project as much as I could but ... all of this is very confusing.

I want a physical PS4 copy of the game, what should I do? pledge 35$ and (if the project succeds) then 70$ for the game? I have to pay so others could get the game? I'm very very confused
 
Warning - Long message:

snip.

Possibly off topic but man as someone who grew up endlessly playing rollcage in splitscreen with my friends and who loved all the wipeout games I have a million questions for you guys

Don't suppose you'll ever do an AMA or something.

Also if you succeed with this wipeout spiritual successor you should really consider a rollcage successor.
It was such a good concept and the gameplay was awesome, even if the IP doesn't have the same mindshare as wipeout it deserves another game.

Also thanks for trying to keep the futuristic racing genre alive, it's pretty much dead (god knows why, and sony were retards for shutting down liverpool)

edit:
R8 Games are NOT Studio Liverpool, they are a small team of people in the North of the UK, and one of their members happens to be an ex-Psygnosis dev, who briefly worked on WipEout 3 over a decade ago.
Is this true? if so then nvm to all my questions xD
 
the best hope we can have is too back this, see it coming in early acess, picking up a bit on Steam, then getting picked up by Yoshida's team and ported over PS4 (or Xbox) at some point.

it's a 30$ buck risk to take.

to me, I'll gladly take that risk. It's the last chance at wipeout we got

This. If I lose the money at least we tried, it's a risk worth taking in my eyes.
 
would pledge for a PS4 version or stretch goal, although that's almost assured at some point, right ?

tbh, though i somewhat prefer what RedOut is doing in terms of track layout: build an expansive environment, and THEN design a track unwinding in the middle of it.
It makes for a much greater sense of scale and therefore speed.
Same approach as, say, Driveclub.

From the short trailer, this seems to be resorting to the old phylosophy of "build a track, then put decorations on both sides" which isn't ideal, imho, especially in a game in which tracks aren't constrained by the landscape's structure.
I think this is what many racers have gotten wrong for years. I understand it was due to technical limitations before, but it shouldn't be the case now.
Plus, it would make building additional tracks a lot easier, and make it possible for the devs to include a very easy-to-use track editor.
 
Possibly off topic but man as someone who grew up endlessly playing rollcage in splitscreen with my friends and who loved all the wipeout games I have a million questions for you guys

Don't suppose you'll ever do an AMA or something.

Also if you succeed with this wipeout spiritual successor you should really consider a rollcage successor.
It was such a good concept and the gameplay was awesome, even if the IP doesn't have the same mindshare as wipeout it deserves another game.

Also thanks for trying to keep the futuristic racing genre alive, it's pretty much dead (god knows why, and sony were retards for shutting down liverpool)

edit:

Is this true? if so then nvm to all my questions xD

Huh. I'm sorry for the misinformation if true, an older Gaf thread about this game said that the game was made by former Wipeout devs. :/

By the way, in a bit more than a day the game reached 1/3 of the initial goal and 1/15 of the funding needed to fully develop this game.

Though I hope so much it gets to the Vita - or at least the console - goal. :/ I'll likely skip it if it's gonna be PC only
 
I signed for the Test Pilot Program, I usually don't like kickstarter things but I was convinced to help this project as much as I could but ... all of this is very confusing.

I want a physical PS4 copy of the game, what should I do? pledge 35$ and (if the project succeds) then 70$ for the game? I have to pay so others could get the game? I'm very very confused
I signed up for the TTP, and i'm also confused too.
i thought that people who sign up for the TTP would get a discount for the kickstarter cause we already gave some money ( i got the gold tier) hmmmm. :(
 
20 pounds of silver is kind of steep, yo. I was in this for 20 bucks but now I dunno.

actually...I'll keep an eye on this. maybe next payday, we'll see. I do love me some Psygnosis since the early days, and I do love WipeOut.
 
Not much info on weapons. It's not Wipeout without the weapons.

The 'spider drones' that infect other racers is about as much as the page mentions.

It's also not Wipeout without loops, outdoor tracks, lots of track variety.

I know it isn't an official Wipeout game but it's being marketed as a spiritual successor and at this stage looks more like a cheap game inspired by it.
 
I've pledged but I'll only be handing over my money if there's a PS4 version, if not I'll just withdrawal my support.

I'm trying to be positive but I just don't see this ever being released unless Sony get exclusive rights as I can't see it being anything other than a copyright infringement of the Wipeout brand from top to bottom, it's like they're going out of their way to be Wipeout and there's no way in hell Sony would give up that without a very good reason.
 
This makes me sad. I've long held onto hope that there were some people left at Liverpool that would bring us a new (official) WipEout for PS4 in due time.
Getting the Designer's Republic and Cold Storage back into the fold is pretty awesome, though.
I guess I'm in, provisionally.
 
I'm in with a placeholder bid. Lets see the fans come out and support this thing.

I'm not worried about the drab looking tracks, these guys can really put the good and crazy shit in there when they get to work. This is just demo stuff.
 
...edited...
I'd rather get an answer for this before I hand over any money, how are you planning on dealing with the inevitable copyright issues from Sony? Do you have any plans other than just hoping that Sony don't hear about what you're trying to do? How will you support your backers if the project is forced to disappear?

I have backed you there's no way in hell that I'm handing over money until I know for sure that you're in control of what will be happening if/when Sony find out.
 
I'd rather get an answer for this before I hand over any money, how are you planning on dealing with the inevitable copyright issues from Sony? Do you have any plans other than just hoping that Sony don't hear about what you're trying to do? How will you support your backers if the project is forced to disappear?

I have backed you there's no way in hell that I'm handing over money until I know for sure that you're in control of what will be happening if/when Sony find out.

They should be fine. They're not actually infringing on any copyrights. Game is only a spiritual successor to Wipeout.
 
Had Sony sued Nintendo for making F-Zero or Koei for making Fatal Inertia?

As long as they don't use the Wipeout name or assets, there's no reason why they would be sued by Sony because they're making a game resembling Wipeout.
 
But it's not called Wipeout and its assets aren't taken from Wipeout.
So there's no IP problem, here.
What scares me a little is that the scenario is not all that unlike (in fact, startlingly similar) to Jeff Minter releasing TxK after having done Tempest 2000 for Atari, with them then attempting to kill any future sales/ports because of similarities.

I don't think it will be an issue here, just bringing up a point for no reason at all, really.
 
The issue that I see with it is not that they're trying to make a futuristic racing game but the fact that they're intentionally using the same design team and trying to create something that reeks of, in their own words, the Wipeout brand. The merchandise that they're showing, for all intents and purposes, mimics an established brand.

It's not that it just happens to resemble Wipeout vaguely, from what they've shown and said so far they are making a point of it benefiting from that brand. If they aren't then why not make it look different, make it sound different, make the brand logos something that we haven't seen before.

I'd very much like to be wrong but I just don't see this ever getting a release in it's proposed state without express agreement from Sony and I need to know that these concerns are going to be dealt with before I hand over any money.

EDIT:
I don't have an account myself but there's a very simple test of tweeting this to one of those Sony accounts that keep getting posted. If there's no issue with the project, then fantastic and I'll feel happier handing over money.
 
I'm a little disappointed it looks just like Wipeout. I was hoping for at least a slightly different aesthetic or some twist on the mechanics. Some of the new game modes sound fun, so I'll throw in some money.
 
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