Elite should make it, they still have month to hit their target.

but it looks like both the Oliver Twins and Molyneux are on the rocks, not sure about the Oliver Kickstarter but Molyneux and Frontier Kickstarters seems to have a lot in common as both developer seem have misunderstood what Kickstarter is about.

I agree with you, but I also think that Molyneux dug his own grave in this instance. His rather ludicrous promises have made him something of a joke in my generation's eyes. (I.e. those who have never played the titles that made him famous. Populous, Dungeon Keeper, etc. etc. etc.) His rediculous promise-breaking in regards to both Fable AND his newer title (He went back on his word about a PC release from what I understand.)

The simple fact is, PC gamers don't exactly hold Moly in high regards anymore, whereas DB still has a solid reputation among his fans, and most of my generation has no idea who he is, but support his idea, and his history with games.

What I'm trying to say, is that I think Moly never really had a chance, whereas FD does.

I wasn't aware that Peter Molyneux rep had gone that low - my image of him still is pretty much derived from Populous - therefore very positive. At least he tries to change genres instead of simply rehashing another game style.

Anyway, except for a small community (alt.fan.elite /salute) - including the users of this forum, ofc - the "great unwashed masses" never heard of Elite, much less David Braben. And the old saying of better to have a bad rep than no rep at all is quite true.

My take on this is that all these publishers have one common problem (on top of other issues): the British pound/presentation.

Kickstarter concept and - my guess - audience is very much american. The idea of promoting your "own" thing and grassroots movement is not European style.

Elite was picked up by loooong time supporters and insiders. The masses went for Star Citizen. Also because the approach to the crowd funding initiative by SC was way way more professional: the difference between "hey, remember me? 30 years ago I launched a genre defining gem of a game and 20 years ago a couple of follow-ups. Now we have the technology to launch an improved version, using this cool techniques to lower the costs and make the creation of a big universe possible" and "remember me - I'm back with a vengeance! And by supporting this project you will get to game on a fantastic universe with detail and grand vision beyond any other space game ever made. Do you have what it takes to be a Space Citizen and fly through space on your own cool spaceship, captain?" (with videos to back up).

I'm not really dissing on DB Kickstarter effort. But it a little naive to think that nowadays you can get the same funding from there with the same approach of, let's say, just 9 months ago - time has passed, and the money getting game has upped. People become more demanding as more professional projects are launched. Personally, it could be a blank page with DB stating: "want dosh for Elite4" - but there aren't all that many like that around.

Now, the KS project is decent, although IMHO it could benefit from focusing on "look all these cool things you will be able to do in this humongous universe (galaxies - several of them! Uncover star systems! ...) - what a great game you will experience" and less on "this is the way we do it in order to make it feasible" (which has a sort of underlying effect of devaluing the investment of the supporters). Now the challenge for DB is to get attention outside KS to the project, specially the American public - but I guess he knows that better than me (and how to do it also).

Done: Proud backer nº 14.250 of Elite: Dangerous.

And have just beaten (barely) the amount spent on LOTRO with lifetime subscription.

Poor wallet..

Peter Molyneux rep has been poor for a number of years now not sure when it started going to the dogs but I think it was when he was doing Black and white.

I Agree with pyros all three of the the kickstarter have a bad attitude to their potential backers in that they seem to be saying

" we are established game developers, gives us money, we make game."

then to rub salt into the wound they don't tell you anything about the game.

 

I Agree with pyros all three of the the kickstarter have a bad attitude to their potential backers in that they seem to be saying

" we are established game developers, gives us money, we make game."

then to rub salt into the wound they don't tell you anything about the game.

That's 100% how I feel about this particular project. From day one this just felt like "look at me, I'm the God of procedural games, throw your money at me and I'll make you a game I should've made 50 years ago ... speaking of which let me share with you some history of my old game (just in case you forgot it) and while I'm at it I will say absolutely nothing precise about this new game nor will I show you something cool to get your interest. Thank you, I appreciate you giving me your hundreds of dollars just for showing you a picture of a concept art I could've pulled from Google Images. You are the best, cheers mate !"

Part one of a pod cast with DB and Chris Roberts talking about their games.

RPS are starting to come around as well now after giving them a good kicking.

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/12/05/elite-dangerous-is-winning-the-space-race-for-my-heart/

Part 2 up now.

Roberts really hit the nail on the head here when he asked about any advice about doing a Kickstarter  "updates content and being prepared". 

Scooptastic there Pinback!

Scooptastic there Pinback!

Just happened to look on the Kickstersite, then got the Email.

Also come with another bit of Concept art.

Run it through Infanview to lighten it.

I thought the foreground figure with the bag was an alien but turn out the two figures are facing each other mind you the one sat down could be some sort of alien unless  it just some sort of flight suit?. 

I don't understand the reasoning behind the showing of the Gary Whitta interviews. 

The concept picture above speaks much more to potential backers than said interviews.

I don't understand the reasoning behind the showing of the Gary Whitta interviews. 

 

Desperation by the look of it, only time will tell.

Chris Roberts really said the right things in that 2nd video, and I stated all along that updates are crucial and really showing your vision. If all games on kickstarter had as much feedback from teh devs and updates as Star Citizen gave us we wouldn't know what games to back, because we would want to back them all. That article bashing devs that just because you have a veteran and well known devs saying we want to make a game and give money is kinda true.... yes you made a game 30yrs ago that was epic for its time, but can you re-create that same game today? That is the question, what will happen if any game we back doesn't make the grade that we have thought about in our heads? I know I have high hopes for Star Citizen and Chris Roberts is right when he says he feels a huge amount of pressure to deliver, it will be great to be him if he does deliver, but if he doesn't then the fans will be pissed. It is the same with Elite, there is a ton of hardcore fans. That want a certain game, will they get it....? 

By watching the slow gains for Elite I think they will make it since they have about a month left, they still have time to WOW us or at the least really make us think we will get the game we expect. I personally would have thought reaching their goal would have been easy because of watching Star Citizen just explode, they met their goal with only a 20 day kickstarter and they met their kickstarter goal in like 3 days. So obviously Chris and Co. did something right. I haven't personally pledged just yet for Elite was going to wait until the last week and see more of what is going to be put out for updates.

Did a little digging, Star Citizen had 48 updates on kickstarter (not counting on RSI site because that's even more) before it ended (its at 53 now), Elite is at 9 and it has been going for what almost 25 days now. That is why the excitement isn't that high personally.

Well said DarkOne. My sentiments exactly.

When Roberts did the first few pitches for Star Citizen, people were kinda floored at the sheer ammount of content they were showing.

Along with all the in-depth interviews, updates and reddit chats. And all those Q&A by Roberts himself.

That alone did lots for the backing of Star Citizen.

AT last some early gameplay footage.

Note that for a PC only game they are using xbox controllers.

Also be interesting to see weather this has any effect on the pledges.

 

Note that for a PC only game they are using xbox controllers.

Well, interesting but I wouldn't read too much into it. Elite: Dangerous is not announced as PC only (just as PC first) - actually, FD states if they can, they will also make E:D available to other platforms. And we all know this game is born to be played with a nice joystick. But on a dev room it is probably less real estate consuming to have gamepads around. Or, more likely, are the controllers they have due to the development of XBox games.

Anyway, very good update. Another great news is that it will be possible to play Elite without being on a permanent internet connection (obviously in single player mode). So the idea seems to be: Single player local mode, Single player online mode (impacts on the "living galaxy") and multiplayer online mode (impacts on the "living galaxy"). Very interesting indeed.

I would like to see some cooperative instanced online gameplay - bunch of friends getting together to perform a mission. Who knows if it won't be possible?

Glad to see more footage. Makes the whole KS project seem more real.

Not worried by them using a joypad just a bit surprised  to see it, have played the Colony War games on the PS1 and the joypad worked really well with these games.

Lets hope you see some more regular update over the 3 weeks.

Another nice concept pic that came with the email

Are the ships flying with newtonian physics or 'star wars' physics ? In the last dev diary video the vessels flight is quite fast and direction changes are very quick too, so I it seemd to be what I should call  'star wars' or 'arcade' flight model physics, which is as point that doesnt really bother me, as I never really appreciated newtonian physics fligh model of Frontier : Elite II

Glad you guys enjoyed the video! Just in regards to the xbox controllers, I really wouldn't read much into that. As Pyros mentioned, it's basically just more convenient for the developer.

Glad you guys enjoyed the video! Just in regards to the xbox controllers, I really wouldn't read much into that. As Pyros mentioned, it's basically just more convenient for the developer.

And congratulations on "selling out" the £20 tier 🙂

Interesting article on RPS about Dizzy return http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/12/12/dizzy-probably-wont-return-admit-oliver-twins/

This quote pretty much sum it up.

I can’t disagree, and we’ve seen similar issues with the Elite and Project GODUS Kickstarters too. Partly, I think, it’s that we want to see proof positive of what it is we’re paying for on spec, and partly perhaps there’s a concern in some quarters our affections are being gamed – that these Kickstarters hastily came about because someone sniffed an opportunity rather than because they were planned-out passion projects. Who knows the truth of it, and who knows what will happen with Elite or GODUS yet, but hard lessons are being taught to a lot of developers right now.

Interesting article on RPS about Dizzy return http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/12/12/dizzy-probably-wont-return-admit-oliver-twins /"> http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/12/12/dizzy-probably-wont-return-admit-oliver-twins/ ]http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/12/12/dizzy-probably-wont-return-admit-oliver-twins/[/url]

This quote pretty much sum it up.

Not quite IMHO. Putting Elite or Godus together with Dizzy is joining a tired game genre with no innovation and mildly evocative with two games that were unique and genre defining (therefore highly evocative). And, since both Elite and Populous were launched neither of the genres had many games. I don't play platformers and even so have at least 10 in my steam account.

That said, there is in common the initial KS effort of all these projects not being, let's say, fantastic. But Elite and Modus have shown something more than an idea with the updates, specially E:D. As far as I could perceive, Dizzy was just a "hey, what about giving us money to do a Dizzy?".

On the topic of E:D KS, FD (kudos to those that understand the previous string of initials at first try ;)) should rework a little bit the pledges.

Personally I would create a £25 10k limited tier just like the sold out £20 one, and "change" the £30 pledge in order to include some extra digital reward: could be early access to a vendor in neutral space (black market fence) or a permit to visit a specific system (if that exists in E:D of course). To truly lure the pledgers I'd say a ship, but that could be a bit too much for the tier (and if was a new model, harder to implement.

E-D Kickstart has come a long way since the initial launch but all three developer seem to misunderstood what Kickstarter is.

Nice idea about the pledges, they could also do the same as SC did with "make mine a double" where they gave two copies of the game.

Still vexed with this planetary landing question as there still no definite answer to the question on the Kickstarter or the forums.

E-D Kickstart has come a long way since the initial launch but all three developer seem to misunderstood what Kickstarter is.

 

Nice idea about the pledges, they could also do the same as SC did with "make mine a double" where they gave two copies of the game.

 

Still vexed with this planetary landing question as there still no definite answer to the question on the Kickstarter or the forums.

mmm   - Godus has a double (30) and even a triple (50) copy pledge level...

Actually, if one looks at Godus KS page, if they had the same per value per pledge that E:D has, they would be just 6k £ short of their goal. Another very interesting difference is the interaction: E:D pledgers have an average of  2.65 posts per pledger, about 12 times Godus pledgers.

Regarding planetary landing, imho it is a given. Silence regarding it feels to be a comunication strategy. Good or bad, will depend on the success...