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Alright, to try to get this back on topic, and since no one's really talked about it much - here are my initial impressions:
Pantheon: Brad Mcquaid's new baby. If you really took the time to read through all the stuff on the kickstarter and all his interviews (I was alpha testing Landmark at the time, so he was a frequent topic of conversation) he had very grandiose ideas of what could be achieved - all the way up to people hosting private servers for User Generated Content.
His Vision is very much about the old school mentality - long corpse runs, harsh death penalties, slow travel. There is a small but very vocal group of gamers who want an MMO like this. The problem, as I see it, is that people didn't do those things when Everquest first launched because they enjoyed them. They put up with them because there were no other choices out there (yes, you had The Realm and Meridian 59 and Ultima Online). Now, when there are many MMO's to choose from, people aren't so keen on waiting fifteen minutes for a boat to show up to take them places.
Brad brings something else to the table: His past. He did a great job with Everquest, but he had Smedley looking over his shoulder controlling costs and keeping production flowing. When he tried to replicate his success with Vanguard, he couldn't do it. Worse, he had several very public personal 'failures' along the way, the most famous of which is not having the balls to fire his own staff in the parking lot.
What I DIDN'T see in any of the videos or interview was a counterpart for him to act like Smedley. He did nothing to show how this project would be different than Vanguard part two. So what Zoltor alluded to came into play, at least in my mind, that he wouldn't be able to responsibly spend that money. His money goal was also way too low for the things he was talking about doing. If he promised less, and asked for less, then added those other things as stretch goals once the game was funded, it very well may have turned out differently.
Now - Star Citizen. This game is for all the PC Gamers that loved Freelancer, the X series (especially those that felt burned by X-Rebirth), and people who just want a kick-ass non-console PC game in general. The type of game he (and others on his team) have successfully developed in the past.
He was asking for a lot (I forget what the initial goal was), but that got blown by so fast it probably made his head spin. So he started listing stretch goals - each one making sense, showing how it would improve the game, while still sounding achievable. His videos show actual gameplay footage, so you can see how the game is progressing. He laid out his plan for how he was going to achieve everything he talked about from the very beginning.
Letting players 'pick' their in game ship by pledge tier was (and still is, since you can still do it) absolute genius. Since I first started this thread, he's gotten a little over 250k more from 'pledges' [Pantheon has gained about another 10k] - not really pledges any more as the money goes directly into the game development: no more waiting for the kickstarter to end for either of them.
My summary: Brad has set out to build a game that only a small percent of the gaming population want anything to do with. He's done nothing to convince me he's changed his MO since his last failure (and yes, I consider Vanguard a failure). If you're new to the scene, you have the same problem - you have to convince people that you know how to handle money and that you'll be able to deliver what you promised.
Roberts found a void in the PC gaming market - with the failure of X-Rebirth and the shut-down of SWG, they simply are no good new PC space sims out there. So he came out and said he's going to build what he was successful at before, but upgraded for all the new technology - no console considerations, PC ONLY. He got people interested, involved, and convinced that he knew what he was about and would deliver the goods.
If I had the money I'd give the pledge - I love X3:TC (it will consume all your time if you let it - one of the few games it doesn't feel like cheating when you leave it running 24/7). I built a 'doughnut' space complex in the ore belt that included forty asteroids and at least that many factories, all connected by tubes churning out products and energy in a self-sufficient closed loop. My plan was to peacefully build up a fleet, go through the plots, then obliterate all the Terrans - The first Terran I met was a mouthy ***** who doubted my abilites. That was a good enough reason for genocide to me
While Brad speaks in vague generalities, Roberts speaks in exacting specifics. And so the two projects go on...
Edit: At this point I'll also mention that momentum is coming into play for both of them. If you give to Pantheon, you're giving money to a game that by all appearances stands a very good chance of never seeing the light of day. I imagine this also seriously hurt his chances of getting any venture capitalists involved - not being able to fund your kickstarter goal isn't the way to inspire confidence.
OTOH, if you give to Star Citizen, you're giving to a game you know is going to be finished and launched, the only question is how many new cool features will get added in between now and then. Every new million gives Roberts more time to pay his staff, which gives them more time to work on the project, polishing and finishing it, and adding new stuff as they can.
Pantheon: Brad Mcquaid's new baby. If you really took the time to read through all the stuff on the kickstarter and all his interviews (I was alpha testing Landmark at the time, so he was a frequent topic of conversation) he had very grandiose ideas of what could be achieved - all the way up to people hosting private servers for User Generated Content.
His Vision is very much about the old school mentality - long corpse runs, harsh death penalties, slow travel. There is a small but very vocal group of gamers who want an MMO like this. The problem, as I see it, is that people didn't do those things when Everquest first launched because they enjoyed them. They put up with them because there were no other choices out there (yes, you had The Realm and Meridian 59 and Ultima Online). Now, when there are many MMO's to choose from, people aren't so keen on waiting fifteen minutes for a boat to show up to take them places.
Brad brings something else to the table: His past. He did a great job with Everquest, but he had Smedley looking over his shoulder controlling costs and keeping production flowing. When he tried to replicate his success with Vanguard, he couldn't do it. Worse, he had several very public personal 'failures' along the way, the most famous of which is not having the balls to fire his own staff in the parking lot.
What I DIDN'T see in any of the videos or interview was a counterpart for him to act like Smedley. He did nothing to show how this project would be different than Vanguard part two. So what Zoltor alluded to came into play, at least in my mind, that he wouldn't be able to responsibly spend that money. His money goal was also way too low for the things he was talking about doing. If he promised less, and asked for less, then added those other things as stretch goals once the game was funded, it very well may have turned out differently.
Now - Star Citizen. This game is for all the PC Gamers that loved Freelancer, the X series (especially those that felt burned by X-Rebirth), and people who just want a kick-ass non-console PC game in general. The type of game he (and others on his team) have successfully developed in the past.
He was asking for a lot (I forget what the initial goal was), but that got blown by so fast it probably made his head spin. So he started listing stretch goals - each one making sense, showing how it would improve the game, while still sounding achievable. His videos show actual gameplay footage, so you can see how the game is progressing. He laid out his plan for how he was going to achieve everything he talked about from the very beginning.
Letting players 'pick' their in game ship by pledge tier was (and still is, since you can still do it) absolute genius. Since I first started this thread, he's gotten a little over 250k more from 'pledges' [Pantheon has gained about another 10k] - not really pledges any more as the money goes directly into the game development: no more waiting for the kickstarter to end for either of them.
My summary: Brad has set out to build a game that only a small percent of the gaming population want anything to do with. He's done nothing to convince me he's changed his MO since his last failure (and yes, I consider Vanguard a failure). If you're new to the scene, you have the same problem - you have to convince people that you know how to handle money and that you'll be able to deliver what you promised.
Roberts found a void in the PC gaming market - with the failure of X-Rebirth and the shut-down of SWG, they simply are no good new PC space sims out there. So he came out and said he's going to build what he was successful at before, but upgraded for all the new technology - no console considerations, PC ONLY. He got people interested, involved, and convinced that he knew what he was about and would deliver the goods.
If I had the money I'd give the pledge - I love X3:TC (it will consume all your time if you let it - one of the few games it doesn't feel like cheating when you leave it running 24/7). I built a 'doughnut' space complex in the ore belt that included forty asteroids and at least that many factories, all connected by tubes churning out products and energy in a self-sufficient closed loop. My plan was to peacefully build up a fleet, go through the plots, then obliterate all the Terrans - The first Terran I met was a mouthy ***** who doubted my abilites. That was a good enough reason for genocide to me
While Brad speaks in vague generalities, Roberts speaks in exacting specifics. And so the two projects go on...
Edit: At this point I'll also mention that momentum is coming into play for both of them. If you give to Pantheon, you're giving money to a game that by all appearances stands a very good chance of never seeing the light of day. I imagine this also seriously hurt his chances of getting any venture capitalists involved - not being able to fund your kickstarter goal isn't the way to inspire confidence.
OTOH, if you give to Star Citizen, you're giving to a game you know is going to be finished and launched, the only question is how many new cool features will get added in between now and then. Every new million gives Roberts more time to pay his staff, which gives them more time to work on the project, polishing and finishing it, and adding new stuff as they can.
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