To be honest, I'm all for that they use stuff like marketing ideas or Facebook or whatever as long as the game content is aimed for a mature audience, it's still money they can use as resources to make the game as good as possible. :)

Sure, I'm not against them using social media, just that tying it to expensive design stuff isn't a good idea imho. I mean, Obisidian are duty-bound to make what was it? A 13-level mega-dungeon in their game, for getting all those thousands of Facebook likes, making a dungeon that big on an RPG is no small task, it will cost them a lot of money and it's only going to be a straight dungeon crawl, with only 1 quest or so (they said that themselves).

Here's hoping it turns out to be something akin to Watcher's Keep in BG2: ToB...

I'd prefer something better. Watcher's Keep wasn't *that* big, nor was it all that interesting. The only two things I actually remember from it are the Demilich and using a berserking Minsc to kill it, and the final twist to the storyline, and that only vaguely.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/inxile/torment-tides-of-numenera/posts
Updated our Journal (7): New $39 Tier, Tides, Novellas, Andree Wallin Concept
Update #7 · Mar. 16, 2013 · 6 comments


TL;DR: New concept art (and wallpapers) by Andree Wallin. Designer/Writer Adam Heine talks about Tides and Legacies (video). Novella Compilation explained and included in a new $39 Tier. Game Idea forum opened. Second Fathom of Castoff’s Labyrinth achieved.

Hi Forgotten Ones,

It’s been a typically quieter second week of our Kickstarter, but we’re still making the news. When we launched last Wednesday, your outpouring of support led Torment to break Ouya’s record for the faster Kickstarter to reach $1M! Your support will not only make an incredible Torment, it already made history.

Our record was short-lived, with the new Veronica Mars Kickstarter’s success this past Wednesday. But who could talk about their new record without acknowledging ours? =) This week Torment was mentioned by outlets such as CNN and Mashable.
New Concept: The Ascension of Kex-Lianish

We’ve received many requests from you to give you some more tools to help spread the word and get more people interested in Torment. The more we raise, the better the game we can create. We are excited to share with you Andree Wallin’s first Torment piece, The Ascension of Kex-Lianish, which shows a crystalline dimension to which you may travel (or perhaps not). It’s available as a wallpaper at our website.

Art lovers – the three concept pieces you’ve seen thus far (Chang’s The Sojourner of Worlds and Sagus Cliffs at Dawn and Andree’s The Ascension of Kex-Lianish) are all options for the Signed Limited Edition Print that’s included in the $1,000 Limited Edition Signed Print tier, as well as the $5,000 and $10,000 tiers. (After the campaign, you will pick which of the available pieces, including these, you’d like.)
Choices, Consequences, and the Tides

Adam describes Tides and Legacies a bit further, and explains some of how they will contribute to Torment’s reactivity.

Novella Compilation – From the Depths

The Novella Compilation features standalone novellas by Colin McComb and Monte Cook, and From the Depths, which includes five interlinked novellas by Adam Heine, Mur Lafferty, Nathan Long, Ray Vallese, and Tony Evans. Colin's novella will be tied more directly to the story of our game, with backstory on some of the characters or companions (no major spoilers, of course). Monte's novella will be a more proper introduction to the Ninth World and the Steadfast.

From the Depths will be a series of novellas interlinked, not in their stories or characters, but in their connections to the Tides and Torment's part of the Ninth World. Each novella will take place in the history of one of Torment's locations, and will revolve around the stories of individuals who, through their actions, embody one of the Tides. We’ve talked about how the Tides are complicated and nuanced concepts – through these stories, you will gain a deeper understand of what each Tide means, and how each manifests itself.

You'll read the tale of Luthiya, a young girl who lived in Ossiphagan, back when the town faced destruction by the Fire Wights, and the extraordinary measures she took to save the lives of those around her. Or the more personal tale of Reen, who led an expedition into the heart of a murderous city in an insane attempt to cure his wife's deadly illness. The third novella is about the abhuman Baji, forced to choose between his people and a group of air-breathing refugees on the brink of death. Then we tell the tale of Zelor, the artist exiled to a world of creatures who could not see, hear, or – apparently – feel, and how he awoke the fires of their minds. Finally, you'll read about the Great Chila – long before she was ever called Great – and the role she played in the conflict between the rulers of Sagus Cliffs and the fugitives living within the Bloom.

All seven of these novellas are included in the compilation, available at the new $39 tier, the $50 tier and all tiers $75 and up (Colin's novella is included in all tiers $28 and up). They are also available as a digital add-on to ANY tier for $15. Any new novellas we may add will automatically be included with this reward.

The printed version of the novellas is included in all physical goods tiers $250 and higher. It will be a limited edition print run that’s only available to backers. (Note that while we are localizing the game text in French, German, Italian, Polish, Russian, and Spanish, these novellas will only be available in English at this time.)
New Tier at $39

For those learning to learn more about the Ninth World, Torment, and the Tides, we are adding a new Lore Aspirant Tier at $39 that includes:


1. DRM-free Digital Game (PC, Mac, or Linux)
2. Planescape: Torment Developer Retrospective
3. Access to the Official Torment Community
4. Digital Strategy Guide
5. Digital Novella Compilation, which includes all novellas (currently 7)

This limited Tier is the same as the $28 one, but adds the Digital Novella Compilation for $11 (instead of the add-on price of $15).
Second Fathom Achieved

The Second Fathom of the Castoff’s Labyrinth was reached this morning as we surpassed 48,000 Backers! We’ll have the Second Fathom available soon, but in the meantime here is the first, sketched by artist Dana Knutson. (This may not be going exactly where you expect - one's mind is not always predictable...)
Community News

We have opened a new idea forum on our User Voice for ideas about the game. We have prepopulated it with a number of decisions we’ve already made that define the game and our plans – most (if not all) of these are things we’ve talked about before. We opened this forum in part because many of the ideas being put into the other forums were game suggestions so we wanted those to have a proper home. We’ve also closed down the Torment Kickstarter forum, as we had moved Stretch Goals into their own and this one had largely served its purpose already.

Since Wednesday, more than 600 new members have joined the forums, bringing us to over 4000! Register at our website if you wish to join us.

We also have a couple new community sites we’d like to call out:

First, Paweł "Ausir" Dembowski has established an official Torment wiki – the place to check up on Torment information we’ve released thus far.

And a Polish version of our tumblr has been set up and is being run by Grimuar Sferowca. We’re excited to have their help in offering our Polish fans the latest Torment news!

Finally, Brian, Monte, Colin, and I are planning an AMA on Reddit next Wednesday, March 20 from roughly 9 AM to noon PDT. We’ll send more information next week. Remember to follow us on our Facebook and tumblr pages (and @BrianFargo), if you’d like more frequent news about Torment.

Enjoy your weekend!
Kevin
6 Comments

48,957
Backers
$2,682,639
pledged of $900,000 goal
19
days to go

According to kicktraq their past few daily totals are about the same or a little less than Project Eternity at the same point during that campaign.

They'll probably break $4 million, but I haven't seen as much buzz about this during the past few days.

49,252
Backers
$2,696,554
pledged of $900,000 goal
19
days to go

Hm, if this keeps up, they should reach the $ 2,75 mio stretch goal in two, maybe three more days.

Would be awesome but frankly, I'm not holding my breath. I suspect PE broke 4 mil. simply because it was the first and biggest among the "blast from the Infinity's past" type of games. I also suspect that lots of fans will be all kickstartered-out this time around.

Tomorrow, most likely, as we include PayPal numbers, which we'll check again tomorrow.

It's slow now but it's doing fine. It'll pick back up for the ending spike or when we announce particularly exciting tidbits.

Oh, I'm not particularly worried. :) Im pretty sure that the KS will hit $ 3 million under its own steam before the ending spike begins, not even counting PayPal or Steve Dengler's contribution.

One thing I like about their KS, was I could pledge through Amazon. I have a paypal account, but do not use it. I would rather use my Amazon account which I use all the time. GOG this would be another ideal way for me to purchase games here, I do not like using paypal. I do not like using GOG, because my bank charges me Foreign Transaction Fees (paypal sometimes does). Amazon should eliminate those.

I missed a few of the other KS drives (wasteland 2, Project Eternity), but have preordered or pledged through their official site.

When they say that the game will be available in Russian, I wonder if they mean just subtitles or actual, voiceacting and everything translated into Russian?