Support NeoGAF

[okayfrog]

After reading the wall of text on his website I've come to realized how many oppurtunites he missed in life and that the situation he is in now could have been completely avoided. I hope he seeks some help though really.

He sought out help and he received it... IN THE FORM OF 10 G'S, BABY!

 

[SmithnCo]

How the hell did this get funded.

Bob really needs to move on. I'm really surprised this is still a thing after so long.

 

[Linkstrikesback]

The person who bid the extra 5k on the last day must have been a fake backer, right?

No-one is that insane.

 

[Yoroshiku]

The person who bid the extra 5k on the last day must have been a fake backer, right?

No-one is that insane.

People are saying the Stanley Parable maker pledged the part that was still needed.

 

[heidern]

wait, didn't he run into a problem before because he never asked nintendo beforehand for the license? i'm not reading that wall of crazy on his KS to see how he thinks he's gotten around that, someone spoil it for me

I had taken too much Ritalin and I was extremely nervous. I stammered through all my sentences. My demo was terrible. The Japanese woman walked around in the demo a bit while the business guy asked me questions about the game. My answers were vague and confused. The Japanese woman laughed at getting hit by a car (which made me feel great), and then the demo crashed at a dinner table scene that wasn't finished.

He asked me if I would be willing to work with my own team within Nintendo. Without even considering it, I immediately said no. He looked angry at this. I immediately felt half stupid and half impressed with myself. After a few more questions, I remember him saying "sadly, I don't think your game will ever be released." I got really angry at that, and it stuck with me for a long time. (I used it in my later "Stage 80" demo.)

The full story is here, including lots of pics from his life:
http://bobsgame.com/

Dude is hardcore. He turned down his own team at Nintendo. He just wants to make the best game ever, and be independent and do it all by himself. He's not going to finish his game because he's just making it without a concrete plan of the finished product and keeps changing it, and for best game ever you can always add to it. But he doesn't actually care about finishing the game.

He's got some(many) psychological issues(he's taken a bunch of different anti-depressants and almost commited suicide a few times) but he's been completely open and pretty much put his whole entire life story on there, the good and also all the bad stuff that everyone normally hides. So in that sense I wouldn't be too harsh on him. He needs a psych(his parents paid to get him to go to one) but he sees them as part of the system and doesn't realise they actually could help him so he refused.

 

[HadesGigas]

Checking in half a year later, this has gone about as expected:

http://bobsgame.com/

I'm currently looking for a job, so I'm going to put a bunch of nice portfolio stuff here.

For the time being, please see my Kickstarter for a nice description of what this is all about!

Kickstarter backers will be reimbursed, and I'll release what I have as open source. I'll probably finish it eventually too!

Thanks everyone!

 

[Ban Puncher]

 

[Corpekata]

If anyone is angry about this, they really only have themselves to blame.

Though I imagine a lot of donors are of the Potato Salad type that don't really care.

 

[Relaxed Muscle]

Quoting myself from this was announced:

AS much as I want this game to be released, I really doubt the guy can complete the game when it already took him like 10 years of crazy developmement goals and the result was a DS homebrew demo.

I don't know what the people donating this was expecting.

 

[Dr Stabbingworth]

$10,000 - "Hack Van" - Used cargo van rigged with solar panels and batteries. It will be cramped in there but better than working in a library or coffeeshop. This is the bare minimum for indefinite and sustainable (but slow) development of the Java RPG Client and Puzzle Game.

His plan was to live in a solar powered van -_-

 

[Riho Hyena]

This got funded? Is the original "bob's game" really so good that people gave this guy $10000 to make another?

 

[ElTopo]

I really hope somewhere down the line this is revealed as an elaborate Andy Kaufman-style prank.

 

[Haunted]

This is Frog Fractions 2, isn't it.

 

[Riho Hyena]

This is Frog Fractions 2, isn't it.

If it was, it would either be some weird meta-game he's doing, made to expose the true meaning of Kickstarter...

Spoiler

I hope this is not Frog Fractions 2

 

[Tiduz]

so, he turned down a job at nintendo only to look for a job now after using kickstarter.

oh boy.

 

[woopWOOP]

Oh wow, I didn't know his kickstarter was actually succesful. I guess he didn't want to live in a van afterall, spent the kickstarter money and now needs a job. Oh Bobby.

 

[Dlent]

gif

Ah come on, we all knew this one would fail at it's conception.

 

[Neuromancer]

so, he turned down a job at nintendo only to look for a job now after using kickstarter.

oh boy.

Wait what?

 

[Team Top Hat]

Not way that Nintendo story is true????!!!

 

[Bomber Bob]

so, he turned down a job at nintendo only to look for a job now after using kickstarter.

oh boy.

That's prolly total BS

 

[Marky Mark]

I don't know what this means or why I just pledged $5 but it happened and we're all in this together.

You. You helped fully fund this.

 

[Hycran]

People believe that he was offered a team at Nintendo? If you even for a second thought that story had even the most infinitesimal iota of truth about it then I have some wondrous magical beans to sell you.

 

[jetsetrez]

Checking in half a year later, this has gone about as expected:

http://bobsgame.com/

Hahahaha.

Even the design of his website is like getting a small glimpse of sheer insanity.

 

[23qwerty]

this... is still a thing???

 

[HadesGigas]

this... is still a thing???

Depends on your definition of thing.

 

[Beelzebufo]

.

"I will give up on Bobs game and start the long journey towards making Bobs game"

 

[komplanen]

I can't believe anyone gave this man-child actual money but at least he's reimbursing it so I guess that's better than I expected.

 

[Camjo-Z]

You. You helped fully fund this.

Hey, at least I wasn't one of the 185 people who actually thought they were going to get a game out of this!

 

[Corpekata]

I'm curious who the 500 dollar backer is. I bet it's Bob himself in order to get over the goal of the KS. I can't imagine anyone else putting that much money into it besides maybe a family member.

 

[Roto13]

https://twitter.com/GranPC/status/474211758568378368

 

[Camjo-Z]

It's alive! IT'S ALIIIIIIIVE!!!

I set the bar low for the Kickstarter but I was hoping it would make enough for at least a year or two of development. Unfortunately it barely made the minimum amount, but in my situation I had to take what I could get.

I chose to get an apartment instead of trying to live in a van, thinking I'd be better off with the convenience and hoping that I'd be able to figure out something else in that time. This only gave me an 8 month extension, and I spent most of it still very traumatized and frustrated and I did not find any other solutions.

Once I ran out, I ended up living in my car again for another 6 months until I could find another way to support myself. I tried sending a pitch deck to over 300 investors and even went door to door on Sand Hill Road. I emailed every publisher I could find. I applied for YCombinator and 500 Startups. None of that worked, so I ended up enrolling in online classes and taking out student loans.

So now I'm back in an apartment and I've slowly started getting back into development after almost 2 years of sleeping in a car.

I've listed both the puzzle game and the RPG on Steam Greenlight, in hopes that I could get on Early Access, which would really be great for my situation since I could possibly make some steady income as I worked on the games.

I'm still moving forward with the games the best I can and I will still fulfill the backer rewards when I am able to do so. I am still living on borrowed time, but I'll do the best I can with the time that I have.

I'm currently porting the Java puzzle game to C++ so that it runs as smoothly as possible. It will be released and continuously updated for desktop PC both standalone and in browser, and on mobile for Android and iPhone, with the source available to be ported to any other platform.

I am doing this as it is the fastest way that I can possibly gain some reliable income, so that I can work on the RPG without worrying about my situation.​

I am not sure what I'm going to do with the RPG. I rewrote it in Java as an MMO so the game world could be continuously updated on the fly. I was successful at doing that but it is very cumbersome to develop on at this point and it needs to be worked on by a team with funding, not one person with no resources.​

I had gotten caught up in the Silicon Valley hype and thought it would be possible to get investment for a fairly large existing project with a cool online demo. Unfortunately that was not the case. It would probably have helped to have had some traction and numbers, but maybe it's just too small of a project for big investors to care, or maybe my background is too risky, or maybe it's just not good enough.

I'm also unhappy with the state of Java, and the client doesn't run well enough on mobile which I was really hoping for and one of my deciding factors.​ I had anticipated that Java would become more popular because of Android and hence also more supported on the desktop, but because of some security issues and the lawsuit between Google and Oracle it became less popular. I would really like to port it back to C++ but that will take a long time, so for now I will stick with Java. I will probably just scale it back to a single player desktop game and release manual updates, or have a good upgrade function built in.

Bradley from the comments section said it best:

2 years and quite literally nothing to show for it. Good job!

 

[Timeless]

I actually feel bad for him now that he's taking out student loans.

 

[superNESjoe]

I actually feel bad for him now that he's taking out student loans.

This game has been a scam for years. I don't think the guy deserves any pity. Anything he says might just be a lie anyway.

 

[Deft Beck]

I bet we've all been playing Bob's game for years now, but we just didn't know it.

 

[Finale Fireworker]

Nintendo should send him a DS development kit. Just for laughs.

 

[giant_frying_pan]

Any time this chap resurfaces, I'm always reminded of Psygnosis's Bob's Bad Day for the Amiga. Now that was a video game!

 

[Kyonashi]

Nintendo should send him a DS development kit. Just for laughs.

Oh my god if that happened in 2016 I think I'd keel over and die from laughter.

 

[Poetic.Injustice]

So many bad decisions..Why would you recode it in Java as an MMO?

 

[BGBW]

What dark magic has the evil sorcerer Miyamoto cast now?

 

[kvn]

So this resurfaced... again? This guy is either a complete troll or one of the worst failures in life that I know of. How can one be so incompetent.

 

[RedNumberFive]

I'll be looking forward to this thread getting bumped again in 2017.

I can respect a man that is willing to fight for a dream, but at a certain point you have to admit that it isn't going to work out and move on.

 

[catbrush]

So now I'm back in an apartment and I've slowly started getting back into development after almost 2 years of sleeping in a car.

My blood is sort of boiling to hear that he's "slowly started getting back into development" two flipping years after a successful KS campaign.

 

[Already Torn]

I actually feel bad for him now that he's taking out student loans.

I think we should start a different Kickstarter page to fund enough money to allow him to see a psychologist.

 

[Fantastapotamus]

Frog Fractions 2 got weird

 

[Visualante2]

Steam Greenlight Bob's Game & Bob's Puzzle Game

Looks like a Tetris clone. Does Ubisoft have a case against it?

 

[catbrush]

Frog Fractions 2 got weird

I think the majority of work on bob's game was done before Frog Fractions 1 ever existed.

 

[superNESjoe]

Nintendo should send him a DS development kit. Just for laughs.

This is now the only thing I want in life.

 

[Fantastapotamus]

I think the majority of work on bob's game was done before Frog Fractions 1 ever existed.

That's what makes it so weird

 

[Johndoey]

I always feel weird about these things, I can't tell trolling from ignorance from mental illness.

 

[wonzo]

MAKE
THE
HANDHELD
BOB