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ReV VAdAUL posted:Neverwinter's current problems show that even experienced MMO devs can run into significant trouble after all. That's a pretty strict definition of "experienced".
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# ? May 21, 2013 09:40 |
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# ? Apr 26, 2024 07:04 |
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I kind of look at the PVE/MMO side of it like icing on the cake. It's probably a little misleading to call it an MMO in the traditional sense even though that's what they are claiming. While you have a champion I don't think you are going to be running around with a 3D model or anything unfortunately. From the screenshots it just looks like there are maps with nodes you'll travel back and forth from and right now the largest parties are 3 people. I guess what i'm saying is the MMO part of the game isn't going to be significantly different than just playing the card game with different challenges/scenarios and they already did a live stream showing what looked like a pretty far along TCG game. I also backed Stonehearth, it looks fantastic!
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# ? May 21, 2013 09:45 |
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Comrade Flynn posted:I grow increasingly happy I backed Stonehearth. They just seem to...get it. Not overpromising I take as a really good sign. They've also dropped plenty of hints or outright stated that they plan to keep adding to the game as long as it's profitable so if they don't reach a goal they'll patch it in later which sounds like they're serious about post release support. I didn't really care too much about most of their stretch goals to this point but I have to say the one they've added with three different kingdoms sounds good. I can see my wife and I picking different ones and seeing how well they work together in co-op.
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# ? May 21, 2013 09:55 |
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I like Stonehearth because the guys making it look like Vin Diesel's nerdy little brothers.
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# ? May 21, 2013 10:41 |
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ReV VAdAUL posted:Neverwinter's current problems show that even experienced MMO devs can run into significant trouble after all. Well, they've been in the MMO business a while, anyway. They've never been any good at it. Neverwinter's going better than I expected, after playing STO for a while.
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# ? May 21, 2013 10:42 |
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TOOT BOOT posted:I don't want to rain on anyone's parade but has the company behind HEX ever made a video game before? Ambitious, never been done before MMO is a really bad way to get started in game development and has a high potential for ending up a clusterfuck. Think Kingdoms of Amalur. Off the top of my head, they've got one of the original designers of World of Warcraft plus the go-to guy in the industry for TCG AI implementation. And like half their employees are ex-Blizzard. Plus Hex should be dramatically easier to code than a traditional MMO, given that it has a menu-based interface and turn-based play.
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# ? May 21, 2013 12:42 |
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pumpinglemma posted:Off the top of my head, they've got one of the original designers of World of Warcraft plus the go-to guy in the industry for TCG AI implementation. And like half their employees are ex-Blizzard. Plus Hex should be dramatically easier to code than a traditional MMO, given that it has a menu-based interface and turn-based play. Yeah, without the need for a persistent world things will be a lot easier to manage. Though I guess that will be offset by the sheer number of server-intensive AI matches they will be running. Too bad it's pretty much a law of nature at this point that the servers of any MMO are going to crumple like wet tissue paper during the first few days. I guess that's the benefit of a 'soft launch' beta - if anybody bitches, they have the universal excuse of "It's beta - things are going to mess up!". The actual 'launch' will probably be smooth, though.
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# ? May 21, 2013 12:59 |
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The Moon Monster posted:I like Stonehearth because the guys making it look like Vin Diesel's nerdy little brothers. As opposed to Vin Diesel who is the nerdy big brother? The guy has been playing D&D for 20 years now and basically based Riddick on his old Rifts character iirc. The TinyKeep guys also did a good job of not over-promising. Their stretch goals are capped at double their funding amount (at around £44k, nothing extravagant), beyond that they'll just add a new creature for every £600. Seriously, go back these guys. I have a question, how do the Stonehearth double packs work? I read the update where they explain it and came away confused. I'm in for $50 right now, I'd like to add another copy of the game preferably also with $50 tier perks. What should I do?
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# ? May 21, 2013 15:23 |
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Zonekeeper posted:Goddammit I can't afford $500 but the Grand King tier is going fast. 4/5ths of the available slots are gone. Wow, you weren't kidding. Every time I refresh the page somebody has pledged 500$. Seems like this game has the highest backer amount per pledge I've seen. Right now it's 160$ per backer.
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# ? May 21, 2013 15:45 |
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Daeno posted:Wow, you weren't kidding. Not even close. The Kickstarter for Dreadball had 2539 backers and raised $730,000, which is about $280 per backer.
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# ? May 21, 2013 16:00 |
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DrBouvenstein posted:I searched the last few pages and didn't see this posted:
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# ? May 21, 2013 16:20 |
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Jedit posted:Not even close. The Kickstarter for Dreadball had 2539 backers and raised $730,000, which is about $280 per backer. Wow. I was way wrong. That(Dreadball game)'s amazing! I'm glad I don't pay more attention to kickstarter...I'd be dead broke. Daeno fucked around with this message at 16:47 on May 21, 2013 |
# ? May 21, 2013 16:41 |
Daeno posted:Wow. I was way wrong. That(Dreadball game)'s amazing! Yeah, in retrospect I'm not sure bookmarking this thread to keep up on Stonehearth news was a good idea :P The main thing I'm wondering about Hex is how popular it will be beyond the subset of people willing to drop ~$150 on a kickstarter. Hopefully the PvE side of things will keep a constant stream of people flowing in.
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# ? May 21, 2013 17:04 |
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SaltyJesus posted:I have a question, how do the Stonehearth double packs work? I read the update where they explain it and came away confused. I'm in for $50 right now, I'd like to add another copy of the game preferably also with $50 tier perks. What should I do? If you're saying you want to add a 3rd copy there doesn't seem to be a way. Maybe donate another $50 through paypal? You'd end up with an extra copy but I'm sure you could find someone willing to split the cost for the extra copy.
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# ? May 21, 2013 18:35 |
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Yeah, in retrospect I'm not sure bookmarking this thread to keep up on Stonehearth news was a good idea :P There are a bunch of environmental factors combining to give it a pretty good shot too. First, Magic The Gathering's online platform (MTGO) is crap, even the new UI they're supposed to be rolling out got pushed back because so many people didn't want to switch to it. Second, Cockatrice, the most widely used MTGO alternative was recently shut down by a legal challenge from Wizards. It had marketed itself as a generic online card game utility, but Magic The Gathering card sets were widely available and pretty much the only thing it was used for. Third, the patent Wizards have on their tapping mechanic are expiring right before the game comes out, allowing Hex to blatantly clone Magic in an online space. I think these things combined with their F2P model, the spiffy advertising, and their TCG pedigree really make it more likely to work out. Worst case scenario, I think it will have a yearish window before Wizards sinks some serious money into fixing their online client, if they can sufficiently build up their base and differentiate themselves with the whole PvE/Champion/Digital aspects then it could become a real thing. If not, well, I bought a shitload of Star Trek CCG cards too; I'm just a sucker for nerdy poo poo and I'm not really ashamed of it.
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# ? May 21, 2013 19:39 |
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fookolt posted:Welp, the last update for TUG was the one that pushed me over the edge to cancel my pledge. I took that money and pledged it to a sweet little game called TinyKeep: I actually did the exact same thing. Thanks for the posting this. Here's what I posted on TUG's comments: quote:I was backing at the $25 dollar tier, but very soon I am going to withdraw my pledge. You have a lot of people with impressive degrees behind the project, but no listed experience in actual making games or putting products to market. (You mentioned you have industry developers, but that was about it...) Most of the information about the game has been vague handwaving that sounds promising but has no concrete ideas to back it up, and without those it seems to be over-ambituous and an "ideas-guy" type of project. The actual tech videos you've shown so far have pretty much all just been of throwing some glowing balls on bland landscapes. I was hoping future updates would show you actual have some real design ideas planned besides "the players decide the direction as the game goes on!!... or something... right??", but instead the only information you post about the game is small features or systems that mean nothing without the larger context of how the game works. It looks like you're going to just miss your goal, and I'm not really too upset about that as long as TUG is some hazy idea rather than a well defined design. I don't know why I give a poo poo about this so much, but it's probably because it's just the first Kickstarter that I've ever pledged for and then thought about how stupid it is.
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# ? May 21, 2013 19:54 |
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bomblol posted:I actually did the exact same thing. Thanks for the posting this. Hah, it was also the first time I canceled a pledge for a project. My pledge cancellation message was a lot shorter though; I pretty much just said I'm canceling my pledge because there wasn't enough concrete gameplay and too much "idea guys" walls of text.
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# ? May 21, 2013 20:07 |
Stonehearth made 400k, so co-op graphical dwarf fortress is gonna be a thing.OBi posted:There are a bunch of environmental factors combining to give it a pretty good shot too. First, Magic The Gathering's online platform (MTGO) is crap, even the new UI they're supposed to be rolling out got pushed back because so many people didn't want to switch to it. Second, Cockatrice, the most widely used MTGO alternative was recently shut down by a legal challenge from Wizards. It had marketed itself as a generic online card game utility, but Magic The Gathering card sets were widely available and pretty much the only thing it was used for. Third, the patent Wizards have on their tapping mechanic are expiring right before the game comes out, allowing Hex to blatantly clone Magic in an online space. I just got really annoyed by MTG because every time I tried to get back into it, half the rules had changed, I could only recognize a quarter of the cards at most, some of my favorite cards had suddenly become illegal (Balance? Sol Ring?), and all in all the learning curve to get back into the game just seemed prohibitive, not to mention expensive. With Hex I've got a chance to start over at the ground floor with a new game.
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# ? May 21, 2013 21:17 |
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$500 tier for Hex is gone
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# ? May 21, 2013 22:21 |
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OBi posted:$500 tier for Hex is gone Goddamn. Now here's a question: Will pledges keep going up at the rate they were before, or will they drop off like a rock? By my napkin math, all of the revealed stretch goals have been broken (once you add the Paypal donors), so the final stretch goal should be revealed soon. Hopefully it can be hit even with all the "affordable" draft tiers gone.
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# ? May 21, 2013 22:32 |
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Zonekeeper posted:Goddamn. Now here's a question: Will pledges keep going up at the rate they were before, or will they drop off like a rock? There's still plenty of $250 tiers left, just not the ones that give you a draft a week for life, which represented the best EV by far if the game actually survives awhile. The $120 tier also comes with a ton of poo poo, including a permanent lasting bonus (the black lotus clone garden thingy). I think pledges will drop off a bit, the fact that the 'draft for life' tiers were quickly going away definitely induced some people on the fence (me) about spending that much money to hop in, but I wouldn't be surprised if it settled at about the rate it was at a couple days ago.
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# ? May 21, 2013 22:38 |
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I think TinyKeep is interesting because instead of using programmer art they are using the stock assets you can buy off the Unity Asset store for a couple hundred bucks, but if they make their funding goal they want to hire the guy who made the asset store art. Seems like a good plan for a small team.
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# ? May 21, 2013 22:40 |
Zonekeeper posted:Goddamn. Now here's a question: Will pledges keep going up at the rate they were before, or will they drop off like a rock? Yeah, the question for Hex at this point is "do we have a market outside of people willing to drop more than $250 on digital card games?". Right now the average pledge is like $150 and I doubt the game can survive on a diet of entirely big-ticket players. If nothing else, if all the people trying to get into matches all are free drafters, that's not sustainable long-term if there are any match rewards.
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# ? May 21, 2013 22:41 |
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Stonehearth made 400k, so co-op graphical dwarf fortress is gonna be a thing. Welp, that's me in for a couple copies.
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# ? May 21, 2013 22:43 |
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Pledged 30 bucks for Stonehearth. I love me some DF clones, with this and Clockwork Empires it's going to be a good year I think.
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# ? May 21, 2013 22:48 |
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Demiurge4 posted:Pledged 30 bucks for Stonehearth. I love me some DF clones, with this and Clockwork Empires it's going to be a good year I think. And Castle Story and Gnomoria and Towns... Which is pretty much why I was so hesitant to buy into this one, since I already kickstarted Castle Story and am 100% sold on Clockwork.
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# ? May 21, 2013 22:51 |
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Yeah, the question for Hex at this point is "do we have a market outside of people willing to drop more than $250 on digital card games?". Right now the average pledge is like $150 and I doubt the game can survive on a diet of entirely big-ticket players. If nothing else, if all the people trying to get into matches all are free drafters, that's not sustainable long-term if there are any match rewards. The median pledge is only $85, though, and the Kickstarter is biased heavily towards people who already follow TCGs which will tend to bump up the pledge total. I'm not particularly worried.
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# ? May 21, 2013 22:52 |
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Arnold of Soissons posted:And Castle Story and Gnomoria and Towns... Ugh. I had no idea about any of these. Thank god I can't fund any of them; especially Clockwork Empires.
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# ? May 21, 2013 23:07 |
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Yeah, the question for Hex at this point is "do we have a market outside of people willing to drop more than $250 on digital card games?". Right now the average pledge is like $150 and I doubt the game can survive on a diet of entirely big-ticket players. If nothing else, if all the people trying to get into matches all are free drafters, that's not sustainable long-term if there are any match rewards. I think at lower tiers it suffers from the same issue as solforge. You can get a starter deck for free at launch and can earn PvE cards by playing, why give them 10 or 20 dollars now when you can wait and give them zero dollars and see if you actually like it. Also with the number of people who've already pledged there's going to be something like 10+ million cards from the first set floating around at launch, so if you just want to play the game, you probably get a better deal waiting for it to come out, then just buying the cards you need for a deck off people with a poo poo ton of boosters. Not to mention the 90000 or so free cards a week from draft play that get created by people. At this point if I weren't planning on getting king I'd just wait and spend that money on set 2 boosters, bet they trade pretty well to all those people with thousands of cards from set 1. Anyway, none of that prevents the game from being popular, in the end if it gets 8k backers or 20k backers probably doesn't matter, as it's going to need more than 20k players regardless. I don't think the lower dollar tiers being unattractive means that game is unattractive to play for free, just have to wait and see how it all turns out.
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# ? May 21, 2013 23:09 |
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HiggsBoson81 posted:I think at lower tiers it suffers from the same issue as solforge. You can get a starter deck for free at launch and can earn PvE cards by playing, why give them 10 or 20 dollars now when you can wait and give them zero dollars and see if you actually like it. Also with the number of people who've already pledged there's going to be something like 10+ million cards from the first set floating around at launch, so if you just want to play the game, you probably get a better deal waiting for it to come out, then just buying the cards you need for a deck off people with a poo poo ton of boosters. Not to mention the 90000 or so free cards a week from draft play that get created by people. At this point if I weren't planning on getting king I'd just wait and spend that money on set 2 boosters, bet they trade pretty well to all those people with thousands of cards from set 1.
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# ? May 22, 2013 00:56 |
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Korak posted:You really highlight what could be an unforeseen problem with Hex. In paper TCG games most people have a limited amount of people or knowledge to trade with other people. In game everyone will know of and most likely use the trading house. This could be a huuuuuge clusterfuck of inflated or deflated prices for cards. I dunno, I checked some online MTG sites and it looks like there are thousands of cards selling for virtually nothing. I doubt it will be any worse than the MTG situation, at any rate.
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# ? May 22, 2013 01:29 |
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Arnold of Soissons posted:And Castle Story and Gnomoria and Towns... Don't forget Banished, which while closer to Settlers does look fantastic.
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# ? May 22, 2013 01:34 |
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The Moon Monster posted:I dunno, I checked some online MTG sites and it looks like there are thousands of cards selling for virtually nothing. I doubt it will be any worse than the MTG situation, at any rate. Yeah, this will follow the normal TCG paradigm of "The best rare cards are more sought after and thus more expensive, while the commons - good and bad - can be readily obtained for a pittance".
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# ? May 22, 2013 02:02 |
Korak posted:You really highlight what could be an unforeseen problem with Hex. In paper TCG games most people have a limited amount of people or knowledge to trade with other people. In game everyone will know of and most likely use the trading house. This could be a huuuuuge clusterfuck of inflated or deflated prices for cards. That wont be a problem at all. While I'm sure Set 1 will be worth less than $2 a pack in the player market, if the game is popular at all, the current amount of packs in the pool to be distributed is not going to make them worthless for a couple reasons. 1. People are forgetting nobody has ANY cards, so everyone needs a lot of them to get into constructed. 2. So much will be eaten by sealed and draft every second of every day. 3. If this game is any good at all, the # of backers will only be a very small percentage of overall players and demand for packs. 4. Even the top echelons of backers are getting roughly a MTG case worth of boosters, thats not nearly enough to get playsets of mythics.
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# ? May 22, 2013 02:07 |
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Korak posted:You really highlight what could be an unforeseen problem with Hex. In paper TCG games most people have a limited amount of people or knowledge to trade with other people. In game everyone will know of and most likely use the trading house. This could be a huuuuuge clusterfuck of inflated or deflated prices for cards. This is actually a great thing in MTGO; Pauper is a cheap, highly competitive format where decks can be made for dollars, and things like the Goon League are easy to play when 90% of your deck costs less than a nickel a piece.
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# ? May 22, 2013 02:30 |
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Part of it depends on what exactly the crafting system is going to look like. It's possible there will be the option to mulch cards for crafting materials, which depending on what you can make with them could act as a pretty hefty card sink. I hadn't considered how that would interact with pauper formats, though...
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# ? May 22, 2013 02:42 |
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Mugaaz posted:That wont be a problem at all. While I'm sure Set 1 will be worth less than $2 a pack in the player market, if the game is popular at all, the current amount of packs in the pool to be distributed is not going to make them worthless for a couple reasons. It depends how tournaments pay out. In Magic Online, tournaments pay out in boosters, and their values are way deflated below MSRP than buying them in the store. The previous two major sets bottomed out at $2.50 of virtual currency (tickets, or "tix"), where if you bought them in the online store you'd pay $3.99 for them. Though, they're now recovering because they're more scarce than the current set and they're all being drafted together. While draft/sealed tournaments are a pack sink, constructed tournaments take tix but pay out in packs, so the price of packs compated to tix is undervalued because the ONLY way to generate tix into the market is to buy them in the store for Real Dollars. If HEX pays out some tournaments in their online currency (Platinum or whatever) then that could combat the deflation of packs, but we'll have to wait and see.
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# ? May 22, 2013 02:43 |
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fookolt posted:I took that money and pledged it to a sweet little game called TinyKeep: I honestly wish I had more money to pledge to this, I normally just pledge the bottom tier but drat this looks like something that could be incredible. If it doesn't get funded with such a reasonable target then that is pretty depressing.
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# ? May 22, 2013 06:28 |
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Perpetual Hiatus posted:I honestly wish I had more money to pledge to this, I normally just pledge the bottom tier but drat this looks like something that could be incredible. If it doesn't get funded with such a reasonable target then that is pretty depressing. Aw, that's okay I really really hope these folks get funded; I talked a bit more with the developers and they are just really nice people. I hope some more goons consider pledging/sharing the game!
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# ? May 22, 2013 06:29 |
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# ? Apr 26, 2024 07:04 |
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I agree, I really hope it makes it. Shame that a figure that's a margin of error in some of the bigger projects can determine whether a cool little game like this can exist at all or not.
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# ? May 22, 2013 06:43 |