I don’t know if you heard of it, it has just been revealed but Team Grounding (Yukio Futatsugi’s studio) will co work on a crowd funded project: The good life which is due for realease in Q3 2019.
Somehow, this is good news as if this model proves successful, Yukio Futatsugi might re use a similar structure to make another Panzer Dragoon:
Looks kind of interesting…Like something Hayao Miyazaki might make…I’ll keep an eye on it.
They apparently mentioned the Switch somewhere but I cannot find where exactly… I really hope they confirm they will make it available on this console because it looks to me the kind of game I would enjoy on the go as well, rather than play on my PC or PS4
Hidetaka “Swery” Suehiro who is directing this, previously made a game called Deadly Premonition. I haven’t played it, but it sounds similar in some ways, making the player feel like they live in/are part of the town where the game is set.
Game Informer recently had an interview with Hidetaka Suehiro (aka Swery) and Yukio Futatsugi about this game.
If you would like to read more click below.
Yup, this article has been re tweeted so many times, not sure why, almost seemed like it was re tweeted by bots !
The game looks interesting, but $1,500,000 is a tall order, especially on a lesser know platform as Fig (I haven’t looked at the details, but it apparently differs from Kickstarter as you can get a return on your investment). I might consider backing it though.
What bothers me at the moment is if you back with 69$ you still don’t get a PS4 physical copy, you will need to add this as an expensive ‘option’.
Also they mentioned wanting to be centered on the Switch version and it is not even in the reward list.
It is a bit messy at the moment (just as its creator’s mind ?)
Yeah, I’m not sure how successful it will be. Only 14% of the goal has been met so far. Still, that price isn’t unreasonable when you consider how many people will need to be paid. Pillars of Eternity II was successful on Fig with a goal of $1,100,000; they raised $4,407,598 in total.
The campaign is only for PS4 and PC (Steam only) versions at the moment. Other platforms may come later (GOG, Xbox, Switch), but the campaign is not about these versions. It costs more to release on other platforms (and is more time consuming to test), so I can understand their desire to reduce the amount of complexity initially to get the minimum viable product out quicker.
Yes but…
Development for the Switch was announced as a stretch goal for your Fig campaign. What does this new potential platform impact your development plans?
Futatsugi: In the event that the game gets funded to the point where the Nintendo Switch SKU gets unlocked, our approach is going to be to target the Switch as the main platform when it comes to performance and the graphical style, then on the PC and PS4 versions to maybe add some additional post-effects and some more bells and whistles. The target would be on the Switch. This game in particular, our goal is to make it so that it is played by as many people as possible as opposed to pushing the hardware to see how far it can go.
So it means their ultimate goal is indeed to make it available to the Switch, even make it the primary platform and tweak it for PC and PS4 so that it looks nicer on it.
This approach makes sense for me, this game is not Uncharted4, this is a sort of mobile game…
The problem is they don’t mention this on the FIG campaign website so how are we supposed to support them if we want the switch copy of the game.
They don’t even mention where/how this SKU can get unlocked. It is a pity because many Switch users could also support this and help finalize the campaign faster.
So even if it’s a stretch goal as confirmed Swery, I still believe they should mention “stretch goal Switch babla” somewhere on the FIG campaign page.
They are missing opportunity to have more people talking about it.
They can’t promise a Switch version to backers if that version isn’t going ahead. It’s conditional. I agree that they should add an explicit stretch goal to the page (from the comments, some info will be added). But Switch users have to realise that if they want a Switch version it will need to be funded for PC/PS4 first before a reward for a Switch version becomes available, not before. So if you want a Switch version, back the PC version.
I totally agree that it’s not unreasonable, given that this is still a shoestring budget for a video game like this. But this is perceived as a high goal by most people. For example, Shenmue 3’s goal was $2,000,000. The fact that many Kickstarter projects intentionally set goals that they knew were too low to actually produce the game has given people the wrong impression.
It’s a problem in general for development. Particularly with the web, there’s a huge expectation for software to be free to use, and people will give up their privacy and independence rather than pay even a small fee to use the service. Still, besides getting people to pay for the true cost of development - either for the software directly or as a service - I don’t see how it can be sustainable to run a development company ethically. And I think you’re right, Kickstarter hasn’t helped give a realistic representation of the true cost (and unpredictability) of development.
I have no problem backing the PC version first. My problem is there is nothing stated about the stretch goal.
On other platforms and campaigns I have supported (Indiegogo, Kickstarter), the stretch goal was always displayed like an unlockable bundle or it was mentioned in the description of the campaign.
Here on FIG there is nothing, and that’s a problem for me, that’s why I still haven’t backed it.
I thing it’s a pity because if they want to do it this way, as per FUTATSUGI’s interview, then they should be clear & transparent on the FIG front page.
But even the PS4 physical release is a bit obscure: you need to support the PC version, then in the next page, you can add the PS4 as an option so:
1/ you will end up with two copies of the games even though some people will only be interested in the PS4 only for instance
2/ some people won’t bother supporting since they won’t find the PS4 bundle on the first page (you know in average people spend less than 10s on a website and close if they don’t find what they search for)
3/ same thing apply for Switch, people won’t see it mentioned anywhere, even though Swery & Futatsugi have plans for it. They are also missing potential media coverage. Anything related to the Switch gets relayed very quick these days. As for the PS4, there are so many games thats the news gets drown among all the rest…
I think this is a mistake in terms of communication. It won’t cost them anything to be transparent.
Regarding the cowdfunging of video games, I will just add that the Shen Mue 3 campaign was only used to fund partially the making of the game (Cedric the co producer told me that).
So you need to remember that a game with a low crowdfunding target might have other sources of funding…
Seems they are working on that as per the comment section of the FIG campaign
Craig L.
I wanted to know more about the Switch stretch goal. Any information is appreciated. The game sounds great. Good Luck, Swery! Are you still working on your novel too?
Sep 5, 2017 | 06:00 PMSWERY
DEVELOPER
We will update soon.
By the way I am still working for that.
Sep 5, 2017 | 07:06 PM
The problem is that they weren’t transparent about it. It only became clear after the Kickstarter had started that they were receiving funding from elsewhere, and they didn’t disclose that at first. Sony reluctantly confirmed that their “help” also involved money. As a result, Ys Net received criticism from people who assumed that they already had secured enough funding, and they were using Kickstarter as a publicity stunt. It didn’t help that a Sony’s Gio Corsi said this:
"We said ‘the only way this is gonna happen is if the fans speak up’. We thought Kickstarter was the perfect place to do this. We set a goal of two million dollars, and if the fans come in and back it, then absolutely we’re going to make it this a reality.
Yu Suzuki later stated that they had in fact already secured funding, but they still needed the Kickstarter money. As we now know, it still wasn’t enough, and they started looking for another company to invest more money into the project. Right now, we really have no idea how much money they have accumulated. To my knowledge, there’s at least the Kickstarter backers, Ys Net, Cedric’s Shibuya Productions, Sony and now Deep Silver who have invested money in the game. It seems like a very complex situation.
As for The Good Life, the FIG page is indeed lacking in clarity. In the FAQ there’s a question about whether or not the game will support GOG.com, and the answer is “For now, we don’t care about for that. It might be happen, but there’s no guarantee”. The poor English isn’t doing them any favors, and “we don’t care” in particular is not the wording they want be using here. And it’s indeed nonsensical that you need to pay for both the PC and PS4 version if you just want the PS4 one. They have a decent prototype and concepts but when it comes to the actual FIG campaign and rewards it seems they really came into this under-prepared. And a bad start is difficult to recover from.
Cannot add much more about the ShenMue3, you probably know more than me about it.
And I agree the “we don"t care” is a poor way to consider backers, it’s one of the things that shoked me the most.
And they probably didn’t realize, a bad translation maybe, wrong wording ?.
This is why at the moment I still haven’t backed it… I really would like to do it though !
So that Grounding Inc is successful and can look at future’s project serenely, especially a project around Panzer Dragoon (remaster, remake, reboot whatever).
Adit: hopefully, the update they are supposed to do will clarify those aspects.
The point about GOG was quite badly worded. Saying that it’s not the main priority would have been better. But I do wonder how difficult it would be to include a GOG key as a reward - it’s not as though it’s a different OS, just a different platform.
Is it me or they seem to be struggling with their funding campaign ?
Seems they updated the campaign again to include this time some bizarre bundles (at least for me), but the interesting one is the PS4 alone bundle which should have been there from the start. It is priced at 39$.
I think I am going to support them now. I want to see GRounding healthy before they start on a new Panzer Dragoon.
