CROWDFUNDING
WHEN CROWDFUNDING GOES WRONG
Written by Chris Lowry
There’s no doubt about it -Crowdfunding can be an exhilarating world to enter. There’s something visceral about the feeling of making a game happen; taking it from an imaginative idea to an actual item you can hold in your hand. The best projects take you on a journey, asking for card suggestions, art feedback, and social stretch goals that you can help them reach by sharing the news. I think, for many of us, it’s the closest we ever get to being a game designer and bringing our own cool creation to life.
Unfortunately, the flip side of the fantasy can be failure. Projects that raise hundreds of thousands of pounds, and then disappear. It’s actually very rare that a creator runs off into the sunset, never to be seen again. Much more often an undelivered game leaves an obtuse trail of missed deadlines, halfbelievable excuses and conflicting promises lying in its wake. Here we look at some train wrecks, some that turned it around, and some tips to avoid disaster.
DEEP SPACE D-6 ARMADA
Tau Leader Games
Total funded $177,480
Deep Space D-6 Armada is a stand alone multi-player sequel to the similarly named Deep Space D-6, that raised more than 600% of its original goal. Unfortunately, that also meant that it hit certain thresholds that incurred VAT obligations and other unexpected costs. During a drawn out saga, a member of Tau Leader Games repeatedly claimed to be trying to get VAT registration in the EU. After dragging on for nearly a year, he announced that they’d failed, and promised refunds to all EU backers. Sadly, based on over 1200 increasing irate comments on the Kickstarter page, that return of funds hasn’t shown any sign of occurring.