Kickstarter
Kickstarter is probably the most well known crowd-funding website in existence. Basically, here you can obtain money for any creative project[1] you have by submitting a description of your project (usually alongside a shot video) and promising rewards to people who "pledge" different amounts.
While the site has enjoyed a reasonable success beforehand, in February 2012 everything changed: not only did an iPhone dock become the first project to raise a million dollars, but legendary game developer Tim Schafer announced he was going to raise money for a new adventure game. Said project ended up raising over 3 million, with 1 million raised in a single day. The Order of the Stick Reprint Drive also joined the +1 million club the same month.
Schaefer's success then caused a large number of game developers to turn to Kickstarter and popularized the crowd-funding concept to a new height.
Notable Kickstarter projects include:
- Successes
- FTL: Faster Than Light
- The Order of the Stick Reprint Drive
- The Planet Mercenary (Schlock Mercenary TRPG)
- ThanksKilling 2 and 3
- Dick Figures: The Movie
- Little Witch Academia and its sequel.
- Kick Heart
- Ogre: Designer's Edition
- The Death of "Superman Lives": What Happened?
- Dude Bro Party Massacre 3
- Harbinger Down
- I Am Big Bird
- Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night (set for March 2017)
- Chivalry: Medieval Warfare
- Divinity: Original Sin (prequel to Divine Divinity)
- Elite: Dangerous (reboot of Elite)
- Freedom Planet
- A Hat in Time
- Project Giana (Became Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams)
- Grim Dawn
- HuniePop
- Kodomo no Jikan (English translation of the manga, releases are set to start in October 2016 and finish in October 2017)
- La-Mulana 2
- Kingdom Come: Deliverance
- Lords of Xulima
- Mercenary Kings
- Nefarious
- Obduction (From Cyan Worlds Inc. of Myst fame.)
- Pale Blue
- Project Eternity (From Obsidian, became Pillars of Eternity)
- Project Phoenix
- Puzzle Clubhouse
- République (Stealth Based Game)
- Satellite Reign
- Shadowrun Returns
- Shantae: Half-Genie Hero
- Shovel Knight
- Shroud of the Avatar: Forsaken Virtues (Spiritual Successor to the Ultima series)
- Son Of Nor
- SUPERHOT
- The Tale of ALLTYNEX English localization
- ToeJam & Earl: Back in the Groove
- Torment: Tides of Numenera (Spiritual Successor to Planescape: Torment)
- Undertale
- Underworld Ascendant
- War for the Overworld
- We Happy Few
- Xenonauts
- Yooka-Laylee
- Zombies, Run!
- |CLANNAD English localization by Sekai Project
- The Grisaia Trilogy English localization by Sekai Project
- Muv-Luv English localization
- Seven Kingdoms: The Princess Problem
- SC 2 VN (StarCraft II Professional Gaming: The Visual Novel)
- Reading Rainbow web revival
- Mystery Science Theater 3000 web revival
- Awkward Zombie: Volume One
- Brawl in the Family: Volume One
- The Saga of Rex
- SWAT Katz: Revolution
- The Riff Trax rights to live-Riff Twilight (changed to Starship Troopers), Godzilla (1998) and Anaconda.
- The TV Tropes Revitalization Project
- Failures (Either cancelled or folded)
- OUYA (The most successful project at the time. People were disappointed with the under-performing console and the lacking games. The company later went bankrupt, and its assets were sold off to Razer.)
- Yogventures (Cancelled after creatives troubles, budget issues and bankruptcy.)
- Red Ash: The Indelible Legend (Will be published regardless)
- RetroBlazer
- Rampage 3 (After previous failed funding attempts on Indiegogo and Kickstarter, Uwe Boll posted an infamous video rant on YouTube insulting his non-backers.[2])
- Delayed (Released later than the intended date)
- Carmageddon: Reincarnation (Released in 2015)
- Double Fine Adventures (In Development Hell for a time, became Broken Age) (2014, released in two parts.)
- Manos: The Hands of Fate HD Restoration (Delayed by five years of restoration and a legal battle with Harold P. Warren's son, released by Synapse Films in 2015)
- The Banner Saga
- Leisure Suit Larry Reloaded
- Tex Murphy – Project Fedora (2015)
- Shadowrun Online (Intended for a 2013 release)
- Wasteland 2 (2015)
- The Last Days of Coney Island (Animated shorts directed by Ralph Bakshi in Development Hell since the 90s, funded in 2013)
- Project Nimbus
- Planetary Annihilation (Spiritual Successor to Total Annihilation)
- Hiveswap,. the Homestuck Adventure Game, funded in 2013 and to be released somewhere in 2016.
- Other/Controversial (Either in Development Hell or in some other controversial situation)
- Potato salad (The most famous "joke" kickstarter on the site. The funding was so massive, it became a charity party.)
- Tropes vs. Women in Videogames (the project has yet to come to fruition, despite the funding it received)
- Veronica Mars film (2014) (The project was fully funded when Warner Bros was brought in for production. Fans were not happy.)
- Broken Sword – The Serpent’s Curse
- Cans Without Labels, a John Kricfalusi animated short featuring George Liquor's last appearance.
- Barkley 2: Curse of Cuchulainn (Its delay is likely a Stealth Parody of the gaming industry.)
- Mighty No. 9 (Marred with controversy that broke its fanbase in two. Delayed countless times, released in June 2016 to a mixed reception.)
- Shenmue 3 (Also marred with controversy.)
- Star Citizen (The most crowdfunded project ever)
- Super Retro Squad (Spiritual Successor to Super Mario Bros Crossover
Kickstarter provides examples of the following tropes:
- All or Nothing: If the project doesn't get the required funding, it gets nothing.
- Follow the Leader: While Kickstarter had hosted hundreds of gaming projects before Tim Schafer, Double Fine Adventure caused several high profile developers to join in. It also paved the way for much more expensive projects: before DFA getting over 100k on Kickstarter was a bit of a stretch, now several projects have tried and succeeded getting money around and over the 500k range.
- Sturgeon's Law: Most submissions are really bad and are typically not funded at all.
- ↑ stuff like businesses, charities, etc, are not allowed
- ↑ Bloody Disgusting article