It was always going to be interesting to see how much attention a new crowdfunding/investment platform would gain, and how successful the proposed projects on that platform would be.
Anchors in the Drift is one of two projects on Fig, and its campaign came to a close recently. It missed its funding goal. By a lot. But fortunately for the developers and supporters of the project, the game’s still coming out.
When 5TH Cell pitched for US$500,000, it wasn’t unnecessarily an unreasonable goal. We’ve heard developers talk about just how much video games cost to make before, and Anchors in the Drift was suitably ambitious — being a free to play action RPG — that their target seemed reasonable.
Thing is, they barely got close. The campaign came to a close on the weekend and raised only US$102,000 from 133 backers, which is an impressive and interesting average of just under $767 per backer. The amount of backers in each of the tiers listed on the campaign page amounts to 125, and the amount of pledged money on the page tallies up to over US$5000.
While that quandary is interesting to ponder — 8 people were basically responsible for investing almost US$100,000 into Anchors in the Drift — the reality is that the game is still coming out. In a post on their Facebook page yesterday, 5TH Cell announced that “the team remains hard at work readying the game for release” next year.
That’s about the extent of information available right now. I’m curious to see how the project will actually be affected and what will happen to the developers on a personal level. Either way, if this was a game you were keen on then good news: it’s still happening.
Somehow.
Comments
4 responses to “Anchors In The Drift Misses Goal By Miles, But It’s Coming Out Anyway”
The breakdown of average payment per backer and distribution is an interesting question. If your game has 50 backers who each throw in $10,000, is that the same as 500,000 people donating $1? In monetary terms it’s the same, but in terms of interest in the game that’s a huge difference as most games wouldn’t get Greenlit if market research revealed that only 20 people were interested.
Good to hear they were able to continue despite not being able to raise the money but it does raise the question of what they needed $500,000 for if development is still continuing at I’m guessing the same pace?
I would most definitely make a game for 50 people if they all put in 10 grand each haha 😛
For real though, I’m guessing this was a market research kind of deal, or that it was just an attempt to get awareness. I’m interested in it, sounds cool, though I didn’t back it.
Probably huge loans that will sink the company if anything goes wrong.
That’s a very dangerous assumption towards companies seeking crowdfunding. Crowdfunding is just one in a series of various funding possibilities some more desperate than others. For example, the owners could have mortgaged their houses, taken big loans from banks, borrowed money from family and friends to try and make this project work…
If anything it MAY prove that they believe in their project alot and chances of this game, despite failing in their crowdfunding campaign has a better chance of releasing a working product than many other games who have had successful crowdfunding drives of lower sums, then used up all their money and released a broken game…