I read the kickstarter page, updates, comments, and watched the videos. My impression is that parts of the description sound interesting, but currently I see no indication that those interesting parts are actually reflected in any way in the game.
Pro:
+ a game with "colorful, exotic, and eccentric characters" that "tackles controversial subjects such as race, religion and sex, exploring how our brain works to alter reality and bias our decisions" could be extremely interesting if done well
+ Dev is open to DRM-free release
Con:
- Nothing of the alleged controversial subjects, references to psychology or cognitive science, or anything else that's interesting from the initial description, is visible in any of the shown material.
- The gameplay material that he's showing doesn't look very well designed. In his update video, there's a door that you can try to open, and then you see that there are explosives tied to its other end, which will go off, and you die. It looks like a trap with no way of spotting it before you die to it, enforcing "trial and error" gameplay instead of interesting puzzles. That's bad game design that adventure gaming has grown out of long ago. The dev even talks about "setting traps" in the video.
- He talks about creating interesting characters, but he doesn't show a single conversation anywhere in his entire material.
- The guy clearly has no idea how to present his project. He keeps talking about unimportant stuff instead of telling me how exactly he wants to pull this project off. In his update video, he admits that he doesn't even have a clear idea of basic concepts such as perspective yet, and he tries to present this as an opportunity for the backers to influence the design. Guy, with a budget such as this I _strongly_ doubt you have any wiggle room for this.
In short, the dev mostly comes across as confused, a bit lost, and - yes - sympathetic, but that's not enough if you're asking for other people's money to create your game.
- He makes a point of presenting himself as an experienced designer whose game was mentioned in Xbox magazine, but he doesn't present a single figure of how his previous games were received and how successful they were.
- If his previous games were any good, then where are the fans to boost this campaign?
- In some shots, the character's figure looks even more ridiculous than Lara Croft.
- The project raised only 25% of its funding level with only two weeks to go, it probably won't make it.
- Funding level seems very low even considering that it's (partly) a remake. According to his business plan, he has exactly 1,350$ for all of the "professional voice acting" that he wants to add. Seriously?
Verdict:
The dev seems to be a nice guy, but he has no clear concept and is most probably biting off more than he can chew. His gameplay examples are primitive and badly designed and show in no way the interesting characters and topics that he apparently aims to tackle. I'd stay away.
Post edited May 17, 2014 by Psyringe
