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Massive Chalice Kickstarter by Double Fine [Complete, $1.2 million funded]

You know, for all that Brad talks about the game being a lot like Fire Emblem and X-Com, I think it has a lot more in common with Romancing SaGa 2. A story that takes place over generations, where one's heroic bloodline determines stats and skills? Of course Romacing SaGa only randomized when you learned skills (god almighty I hate that franchise's skill system), so depending on how random the events are the other half of the game's equation might be King of Dragon Pass.

Of course, Fire Emblem and X-Com are way better known niche titles, and have had some massive (heh) exposure in the past year. Still, someone should sit him down with a Japanese translator and make him play RS2.
 
No stretch goals kinda doesn't want to make me up my pledge tbh.

If you don't want to up your pledge because stretch goals are missing, then your pledge is already at the appropiate level.

Double Fine are doing the right thing here when they say that the want to avoid to promise things about the design at this stage, and if you know that everything you pay goes to the game anyway, then it shouldn't matter.

Everyone should actually thank DF for taking a stance against the stretch goals hysteria that has plagued kickstarter projects.
 
If you don't want to up your pledge because stretch goals are missing, then your pledge is already at the appropiate level.

Double Fine are doing the right thing here when they say that the want to avoid to promise things about the design at this stage, and if you know that everything you pay goes to the game anyway, then it shouldn't matter.

Everyone should actually thank DF for taking a stance against the stretch goals hysteria that has plagued kickstarter projects.

Yeah, I pledged the basic amount of get the game because I am interested in it. I would be interested in pledging more, but I want to see what that extra would do for the game. The nebulous "bigger and better" doesn't really motivate me.

Still excited about the game and glad they reached their goal.
 
No stretch goals kinda doesn't want to make me up my pledge tbh.

That could be a potential problem latter on the campaign. I also tend to tweak my pledge if there's some possibility to reach a stretch goal near the end. I know that my pledge isolated won't matter but if enough people do the same then it could be a real problem.


If you don't want to up your pledge because stretch goals are missing, then your pledge is already at the appropiate level.

Double Fine are doing the right thing here when they say that the want to avoid to promise things about the design at this stage, and if you know that everything you pay goes to the game anyway, then it shouldn't matter.

Everyone should actually thank DF for taking a stance against the stretch goals hysteria that has plagued kickstarter projects.

Ok. That's actually an excellent point. I just hope they can reach a balance of having something to offer without messing with the feasibility/budgeting of the game.
 
btw I dunno how relics work but I think it'd be best if you could either turn it off or unequip it.

I hate starting off with a boost, I appreciate the reward but I like my difficulty curve untouched.

cosmetic rewards are the best imo
 
Jeez. I wonder if they've given any thought to this beyond the basic concept. There is nothing to this kickstarter and it has been out for nearly a week.
 
Jeez. I wonder if they've given any thought to this beyond the basic concept. There is nothing to this kickstarter and it has been out for nearly a week.

I'm pretty sure they've got a good idea of what they sort of want to make but they're going to interact with the backers to determine exactly what they make, which is... ideal, for this kind of funding process imo.
 
Jeez. I wonder if they've given any thought to this beyond the basic concept. There is nothing to this kickstarter and it has been out for nearly a week.

From what I understand this game is really on the first stages of pre-production. They are essentially pitching us a concept. If you like that concept and trust them, pledge away. If you like the concept but are a bit wary they won't deliver on the pitch, wait for them to give some more substantial updates or wait to buy the game after release.
 
Jeez. I wonder if they've given any thought to this beyond the basic concept. There is nothing to this kickstarter and it has been out for nearly a week.

Broken Age was almost literally nothing more than Tim saying "I want to make an adventure game." This is significantly more fleshed out than their last Kickstarter.
 
This could be really awesome. One thing that burned me about Fire Emblem is that even though permadeath is a cruel punishment if you really like that character and make one mistake, you really had nothing left behind by the character, and i'm sure most people just soft-reset anyway.
 
I figure this will become the new "thing".

I find the lack of stretch goals refreshing, things were getting ridiculous when you were getting like 375% MOAR CONTENT AND REACTIVITY every two days.

I just want a nice game + digital ost + digital artbook level at $35 and I'll up my pledge.

as much as I'd love to going 50 is just too much for me right now.
 
I find the lack of stretch goals refreshing, things were getting ridiculous when you were getting like 375% MOAR CONTENT AND REACTIVITY every two days.

I just want a nice game + digital ost + digital artbook level at $35 and I'll up my pledge.

as much as I'd love to going 50 is just too much for me right now.

Torment: Tides of Numera got "MOAR DEEPER STORYLINE" so many times it better blow the fucking doors off of Nabokov reading a dramatic interpellation of King Lear to the melodic background of a Finnegan's Wake opera written by Handel.
 
Until the dudes at inXile start their third kickstarter w/o releasing anything: Baldur's Fence Post.*




*No association with Baldur's Gate

someone gotta bring back battle chess dude

Torment: Tides of Numera got "MOAR DEEPER STORYLINE" so many times it better blow the fucking doors off of Nabokov reading King Lear to the melodic background of a Finnegan's Wake opera written by Goethe.
picture that with 245% more shakespeare and you got torment tides of numenera
 
Considering how many stretch goals are pure BS in regards to cost ($25k for boxes or some music option or a new planet type?), it is a good approach.
 
Hey Chris, if you guys reach 2 Million, can you promise to bring in Sean Vanaman to guest write a three sentence dream sequence about dunking on Obama?
 
Torment: Tides of Numera got "MOAR DEEPER STORYLINE" so many times it better blow the fucking doors off of Nabokov reading a dramatic interpellation of King Lear to the melodic background of a Finnegan's Wake opera written by Handel.

Well they sure got 400% more writers than Nabokov ever had to his novels. :P
 
I re-read the Massive Chalice Kickstarter page more attentively, and contrary to my initial belief the 2PP "behind-the-scenes videos" will be available to the public (though I'm still not clear on whether or not it will be a full-blown episodic documentary series with all the bells and whistles like the previous project). Pretty happy about that since I was getting ready to back MC just to gain access to those vids, despite not being interested in playing a strategy game. That being said, the campaign's resounding success makes me happy for Double Fine. So many awesome peeps working over there, as showcased by the amazing DFA doc.
 
As long as you can ditch it I guess. I always feel that any of the extra pre-order (or equivalent) makes the game too easy.

It's a single player game.

The only thing more ridiculous than this is people that ask if they can kill their gay party members in RPGs.
 
Oh.

During Dragon Age 2's dev cycle, one dude in the BSN (BioWare Social Network) asked David Gaider if he could recruit gay members just to kill them.
 
If they want to raise more money for their game, they need to add stretch goals. It's simple as that. Sure, not having them might be the 'right' thing, but almost no one gives you money for being right. You need to put another carrot on the stick.
 
Oh.

During Dragon Age 2's dev cycle, one dude in the BSN (BioWare Social Network) asked David Gaider if he could recruit gay members just to kill them.

And like every character in that game wound up bisexual, poor racist dude must have had a party of just him and that DLC priest guy.
 
If they want to raise more money for their game, they need to add stretch goals. It's simple as that. Sure, not having them might be the 'right' thing, but almost no one gives you money for being right. You need to put another carrot on the stick.

They seem pretty satisifed with what they gotten so far, so they might not need to put on the "crazy sales person" hat. They have their team, their game engine and no really pressure added by stretch goals, so it might be that they can get the game properly done with $1mil - $1.5 mil.
 
They seem pretty satisifed with what they gotten so far, so they might not need to put on the "crazy sales person" hat. They have their team, their game engine and no really pressure added by stretch goals, so it might be that they can get the game properly done with $1mil - $1.5 mil.

I hope you are right. The only thing that concerns me is that Doublefine Adventure seemed a lot less ambitious and cost a lot more than this is budgeted for.
 
I hope you are right. The only thing that concerns me is that Doublefine Adventure seemed a lot less ambitious and cost a lot more than this is budgeted for.

We will definitely find uses for any additional budget we can get, and it will make the game better for sure, but one thing to keep in mind about this game as compared to Broken Age is that Broken Age is an adventure game, meaning it's pretty much ALL content. MASSIVE CHALICE is more weighted on the systems side, which requires a lot of design iteration and tuning, but less on the straight-up unique content side where everything that happens in the game has to be uniquely scripted and animated. They're just different beasts.
 
If they want to raise more money for their game, they need to add stretch goals. It's simple as that. Sure, not having them might be the 'right' thing, but almost no one gives you money for being right. You need to put another carrot on the stick.
why do have to get more money than what they asked?

it's like the most honest thing ever, they take extra but won't be pushing for it aggressively.

it's commendable
 
why do have to get more money than what they asked?

it's like the most honest thing ever, they take extra but won't be pushing for it aggressively.

it's commendable
I said 'want' instead of 'have' for a reason. I'm sure they plan on doing other things to help bump up people's interest and get more backers on board, but from the kickstarters that have come before them, stretch goals seem the easiest path to more money. They don't have to reach for a million or two if they believe they can make the game for what they asked, and considering Brad Muir has already been lead on a game before, I have no doubts he could. I also don't see the harm in stretch goals as long as they're reasonable.
 
Q8fknoq.jpg
:D
 
I said 'want' instead of 'have' for a reason. I'm sure they plan on doing other things to help bump up people's interest and get more backers on board, but from the kickstarters that have come before them, stretch goals seem the easiest path to more money. They don't have to reach for a million or two if they believe they can make the game for what they asked, and considering Brad Muir has already been lead on a game before, I have no doubts he could. I also don't see the harm in stretch goals as long as they're reasonable.

It's just that there isn't anything we would rather commit to except "make the game better." Like, there's no specific thing to link to a specific stretch goal dollar amount that is ACTUALLY better for the game than simply, "Use these extra resources in whatever way it turns out the game needs them over the course of development." We could make up some arbitrary stuff that we're then on the hook to deliver, but who's to say that actually makes the game better in reality? What if it turns out, 50% through development, that the $200k we got for this one stretch goal would actually be much better spent on a new feature nobody had thought of back during the KS campaign, but now we can't reallocate that money because it's already been publicly promised? There's no way to know in advance if that's what the game truly needs until you get there. We'd LOVE tons more money! We'd love extra millions of dollars, and the game would definitely be better! :)

I know that's not a sexy thing to put in an update, but it's true. We're actually struggling with this in our internal conversations right now! How do we communicate that in a way that gets non-developers excited? It's pretty tough. I guess we just have to hope that the core concept of the game catches people's imagination in the right way.
 
[...]I know that's not a sexy thing to put in an update, but it's true. We're actually struggling with this in our internal conversations right now! How do we communicate that in a way that gets non-developers excited? It's pretty tough. I guess we just have to hope that the core concept of the game catches people's imagination in the right way.

Judging from this thread, if you include same-sex marriages that can have either magical or adopted children as a stretch goal people here would give you millions thousands of dollars.

W0jmZ.gif

Just sayin'.

---
That said, I just upped my pledge from 20 to 50 dollars to get the Early Access and in-game relic. (Extra in-game items are my kryptonite, FYI).
 
I said 'want' instead of 'have' for a reason. I'm sure they plan on doing other things to help bump up people's interest and get more backers on board, but from the kickstarters that have come before them, stretch goals seem the easiest path to more money. They don't have to reach for a million or two if they believe they can make the game for what they asked, and considering Brad Muir has already been lead on a game before, I have no doubts he could. I also don't see the harm in stretch goals as long as they're reasonable.

they're saying it'd be disingenuous to ask for more money since they don't know where to allocate it yet

they'll take all your money and use it well

give you nicer things if you pledge more

I like it
 
It's just that there isn't anything we would rather commit to except "make the game better." Like, there's no specific thing to link to a specific stretch goal dollar amount that is ACTUALLY better for the game than simply, "Use these extra resources in whatever way it turns out the game needs them over the course of development." We could make up some arbitrary stuff that we're then on the hook to deliver, but who's to say that actually makes the game better in reality? What if it turns out, 50% through development, that the $200k we got for this one stretch goal would actually be much better spent on a new feature nobody had thought of back during the KS campaign, but now we can't reallocate that money because it's already been publicly promised? There's no way to know in advance if that's what the game truly needs until you get there. We'd LOVE tons more money! We'd love extra millions of dollars, and the game would definitely be better! :)

I know that's not a sexy thing to put in an update, but it's true. We're actually struggling with this in our internal conversations right now! How do we communicate that in a way that gets non-developers excited? It's pretty tough. I guess we just have to hope that the core concept of the game catches people's imagination in the right way.

Put this all in an update.

Do it.
 
Oh.

During Dragon Age 2's dev cycle, one dude in the BSN (BioWare Social Network) asked David Gaider if he could recruit gay members just to kill them.

To be fair, that seems like something someone from 4Chan would ask to get a rise out of Gaider and BSN posters.

Considering the adoration and respect 4Chan has for Bioware writers.


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On a less puerile note, has Muir indicated that Double fine is ready to release some more preliminary art to showcase the target aesthetic of the game?
 
You don't know the BSN.

Tali sweat.


I just searched that and...that is a really dark place someone has to be in to devote such thought into fictional universes. I mean, I've geeked out over the verisimilitude of Star Trek and Star Wars technology before, but that tali thing is taking it a bit too far. At some point, their fandom crossed the rubicon into creepy obsession.
 
It's just that there isn't anything we would rather commit to except "make the game better." Like, there's no specific thing to link to a specific stretch goal dollar amount that is ACTUALLY better for the game than simply, "Use these extra resources in whatever way it turns out the game needs them over the course of development." We could make up some arbitrary stuff that we're then on the hook to deliver, but who's to say that actually makes the game better in reality? What if it turns out, 50% through development, that the $200k we got for this one stretch goal would actually be much better spent on a new feature nobody had thought of back during the KS campaign, but now we can't reallocate that money because it's already been publicly promised? There's no way to know in advance if that's what the game truly needs until you get there. We'd LOVE tons more money! We'd love extra millions of dollars, and the game would definitely be better! :)

I know that's not a sexy thing to put in an update, but it's true. We're actually struggling with this in our internal conversations right now! How do we communicate that in a way that gets non-developers excited? It's pretty tough. I guess we just have to hope that the core concept of the game catches people's imagination in the right way.
That's how you should do it then.

Stretch goals:
$1 million - Make game better.
$1.2 million - Make game even better than previous tier.
$1.5 million - One new amazing feature. Possibly two!
$2 million - Improved visuals and/or sounds. You won't believe your eyes and/or ears!

Honestly I can't think of any specific goals that might turn out to suck, or be harder to implement than they sound.
 
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