The Glade 4.0

Okay, so we've all heard about the Tim Schafer Kickstarter, and though it's the wrong forum for it to be strictly relevant, heard about Rich Burlew's Kickstarter.

Meh.

The projects that have caught *my* eye are threefold. And, since they're not making headlines all over the Internet due to catering to an established fanbase of prior work or franchise, I invite you to have a look if you've not heard of them. I'm pretty sure some of you guys will be interested in at least one of these; and, unless you're also regular readers of Rock, Paper, Shotgun, most of you probably haven't heard of them, either.

The first to catch my eye (and finally get me to register an account on Kickstarter), is a tiny project (3 guys!) called FTL. It's a charmingly lo-fi sprite-based game that describes it as a "Spaceship Simulation Roguelike-like" game revolving around Trek-riffing themes of exploration and combat with the unknown. It's open for another 11 days, and is already funded several times over, so this one's a go, and probably the one that will deliver soonest of the three I'm pointing out today.

Next up, is Wasteland 2. Never heard of Wasteland? It's what inspired Fallout. The creator of the original (and (co-?)founder of Interplay) is getting some of the original team back together, including writer Michael Stackpole. And they want to keep it old-school (top-down, turn-based), but also solicit input from the fans. It is also funded (and thus a go), and 4 days into the Kickstarter project, has already attained 50% more than its funding goal. It's got most of a month left if you want to get in on it.

Finally, and this is the one that's managed to wrest the most of my hard-earned cash from my wallet with a smile on my face, is The Banner Saga. RPS had me following this before they put their Kickstarter project up yesterday, and it looks absolutely stunning. Another turn-based strategy game with an interactive story, The Banner Saga is a tribe of beautifully cel-shaded Vikings attempting to survive Ragnarok. And it's brought to you by 3 Bioware expats. As I reloaded the page to get a URL for the link, I see it's doubled in progress since I backed it this morning, and so it looks like a sure thing to be funded any hour now. It's open for another month.

And now, I must stop clicking on RPS stories that involve Kickstarter games. Because those lovely indie developers with more great ideas than star power are going to send me to the poor house...

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

Ok, The Banner Saga looks awesomely cool.

(More than a little big of scandinavian heritage in my veins)

I wouldn't count the Wasteland 2 kickstarter as a low profile kickstarter at all. It's being talked about pretty much every where I go for gaming news.

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Los Angeles Kings 2014 Stanley Cup Champions

"I love this **** team right here."
-Jonathan Quick

Hmm. Okay. *shrug* I hadn't seen any mention of it here, and it wasn't kicking up headlines at non-gaming sites the way the OOTS and DoubleFine ones did. I don't browse beyond about 2 sites for gaming...

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

pfft. Erfworld, not OOTS.

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Grenade 3 Sports Drink. It's fire in the hole.. Your hole!

I contributed to the Schafer kickstarter. #OBEYTHESCHAFER

Okay, now I definitely can't call Wasteland 2 a "lower profile" Kickstarter.

Brian Fargo's just announced that if they achieve another half-million dollars in the 17 days remaining (2.1 million total), he can get Obsidian Entertainment in on the project.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

I'm skeptical of Obsidian's ability to do an RPG on a new engine with a new combat system. All their sequels with an established engine and game rules (KOTOR 2, NWN 2, New Vegas) have been excellent, but whenever they have to do the engine or game rules/mechanics from scratch, they typically fail pretty hard. (Alpha Protocol, Dungeon Siege III) Their upcoming South Park RPG isn't looking too promising either, as they laid off a bunch of people from the development team.

Obsidian's ability to produce bug-ridden but interesting games is now legendary to me.

I will probably disregard it.

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Grenade 3 Sports Drink. It's fire in the hole.. Your hole!

Lol.

My consolation is, there won't be a publisher breathing down their necks to cut content to release on a schedule.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

Eh.

Of what they've released, only DS3 has been really solidly bugless, from what I hear. (All of the other stuff of theirs I've played is buggy.) That was done with Square-Enix breathing down their necks.

Either they got lucky once, or they might be turning over a new leaf.

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Grenade 3 Sports Drink. It's fire in the hole.. Your hole!

New Vegas is probably one of the best games I've ever played. Bugs and all. But yeah, they are usually a lot better at taking someone else's game and making a sequel. Then again, Wasteland 2 is a sequel, it just won't be the same game as Wasteland was and they will have to build it from the ground up. With Fallout and Neverwinter Nights, they made some minor tweaks to already existing engines and made a game(though I will say that NWN2 was a bigger tweak than New Vegas was). Aside from adding in some more levels and classes, I don't think they changed anything about the KotOR engine.

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Los Angeles Kings 2014 Stanley Cup Champions

"I love this **** team right here."
-Jonathan Quick

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Banner Saga is in its last week of funding, not that it matters (they're at 500% of their goal), but I backed it today. I don't even like tactical games*, but it looks too good to not throw $10 at.

*Not completely true. I like them, but they get too tedious. I've never finished one, but got close with Joan D`Arc on PSP.

Also, Jordan Weisman said in an interview with ShackNews that with the response to Shadowrun Returns, after they get that taken care of, he's interested in revisiting the Crimson Skies license.

My heart is all a-twitter. Now, I just need to start some kind of campaign to subliminally surround him with hexes so he makes it a turn-based wargame/tactical video-game instead of just an updated flight sim...

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/leisuresuitlarry/make-leisure-suit-larry-come-again?ref=category

The original man is back!

There's essentially an entire company in Austin staffed by ex-Sierra from the real days (think kings quest, space quest, etc) just waiting to get some work done. Hooray!

8k and change on the final stretch goal for The Banner Saga; ~5 hours to go.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

Quite glad the Banner Saga linked Legends of Eisenwald in their recent update as one of their personal choices (apparently in response to fans asking what they had their eyes on). It also looks pretty neat.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

The PA Report did an interesting bit on Kickstarter, and how you should think of yourself in relation to any Kickstarter campaign.

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Yep. That's a good read that promotes a good attitude. They say a lot of the same things I would say while describing the way I choose projects.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

Yeah, all it's going to take is for a big kickstarter project to fail miserably, and the gold rush will be over.

Kick starter is kinda cool except people apparently think having a successful kick starter is a substitute for doing actual work/updates/etc.

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/10x10room/conclave

The premise behind it is neat. It strikes me as a visual platform for pbp/pbem gaming.

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Buckle your pants or they might fall down.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/sub ... overworld/

Dungeon Keeper 3. I really hope this happens.