Wasteland 3 - Stretch Goals

[Silver]

Wasteland 3 has been funded and with that taken care of come stretch goals for the remainder of the campaign.

$2.85M: 37 Pieces of Flair - We unlock further Ranger customization, which could include multiple body types, more heads, and more hairstyles. Plus we'll show items that your Ranger has equipped (gear like shovels, binoculars, etc) on their models.
$3M: Car Companion (Codename: Morningstar) - We add a talking car companion! Morningstar is an AI built to serve President Reagan, but he'll help you both in your travels and during combat, plus he'll give you well-timed advice on how to wipe out all the dirty commies out there. See more on him below!
$3.1M: Customizable Ranger Squad Insignia - At the start of the game, you get to customize a Ranger Squad insignia for your team, which will show up on your Ranger Base as well as elsewhere in the game (on flags, for example).

More information.

 

[Stingray]

Wow, probably the worst stretch goals of any major campaign that we've seen. It's like they don't really care if they get any more money or not. (Maybe they really don't?)

Campaign has 13742 backers after its first 4 calendar days. At the same point in their campaigns, Wasteland 2 had 22963 backers, Torment had 42440, and Bard's Tale IV had 24257. So by any past measure of crowdfunding success, this campaign is a pretty massive flop so far.

Could be we're just looking at the new world of "crowd"funding though - big money individual investors instead of backers? For the developer, I guess Fig investors are preferable to traditional investors/publishers - they have no say over the project. Maybe Fargo just correctly anticipated that crowdfunding would eventually flop and had the solution all ready to go. I guess we'll see.

 

[ikbenrichard]

Campaign has 13742 backers after its first 4 calendar days. At the same point in their campaigns, Wasteland 2 had 22963 backers

That is indeed a disappointment. I think WL2 was quite good and really looking forward to WL3.

 

[joxer]

Wow, probably the worst stretch goals of any major campaign that we've seen. It's like they don't really care if they get any more money or not. (Maybe they really don't?)

I'll have to agree but because of other reasons.
These things IMO should have been in the main project. What they should have put as stretch at some 5 million or something is the damned MMO.

 

[you]

No mmo please. Otherwise agree stretch goals mega suck.

 

[ChienAboyeur]

Wow, probably the worst stretch goals of any major campaign that we've seen. It's like they don't really care if they get any more money or not.

The stretch goals look the opposite. 100 k$ for some insignas look overpriced.
The others might be the same.

Looks like they are trying to roll a pledge train while promising the less they can. It is all about the money. People must keep in mind that backers support the point of view that a bigger budget means a better product.
In the context of these stretch goals, backers are to think that the excess of money raised will go to make the rest of the product better.

It is not about adding features, it is about making the budget as big as possible on the sole belief a bigger budget means a better product.

 

[Archangel]

That is indeed a disappointment. I think WL2 was quite good and really looking forward to WL3.

The backer numbers for WL3 speak a different story about how good WL2 was...

 

[Hastar]

Wasteland 2 was great. One of the few RPG's I played thru twice.

 

[ChaosTheory]

The crowdfunding is disappointing because it wasn't necessary, and people aren't stupid. WL3, when released, will sell just fine due to those of us who didn't feel compelled to give an established game producer money up front. Again.

Although admittedly, those 37 pieces of flair have me seriously questioning my principles. Trying…. Not…. to… pledge….

 

[JDR13]

The backer numbers for WL3 speak a different story about how good WL2 was…

Not necessarily. I think it says more about crowdfunding in general and the way people are starting to get burned out on it. Plus you can't compare it with WL2 because Kickstarter is far more popular than Fig.

 

[you]

I will admit that fig encourages investors and kickstarter backers (I think the fig model is better because you can actually have a chance of obtaiing something for your $$).
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I will be curious to see how well wl3 sells and if the investors do ok.
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I myself have pretty much abandoned kickstarter as too many of the projects turned out lame in the mega sense.

 

[rjshae]

In the end, the only thing that matters is the net funding. This one is well on the way to booting Wasteland 2 out of the ballpark.

Anyway, the car concept may be entertaining.

 

[DarNoor]

Could be we're just looking at the new world of "crowd"funding though - big money individual investors instead of backers? For the developer, I guess Fig investors are preferable to traditional investors/publishers - they have no say over the project. Maybe Fargo just correctly anticipated that crowdfunding would eventually flop and had the solution all ready to go. I guess we'll see.

There may be a couple other reasons that it seems to be under performing.

1) Fig is new. A lot of people never even heard of it or even understand it.

2) There didn't seem like a lot of build up for this campaign. I remember hearing about the WL2 campaign weeks before it went live. So, people not only new about the campaign, but, the anticipation was huge. Then when it finally did go live, people couldn't wait to throw money at it. I didn't even know about the WL3 campaign until it went live. And i still don't understand fig.

 

[Stingray]

1) Fig is new. A lot of people never even heard of it or even understand it.

I don't give this potential reason as much credit as some others seem to be. Computer gamers don't just browse Kickstarter for projects to support. Most of them hear about it through gaming websites, forums, etc. I don't see why it would really matter to many people whether something is on Kickstarter or Fig or whatever else. Certainly not enough to account for inXile losing approx half its backers since its last project. Most of us had never heard of Kickstarter before Wasteland 2's KS went up - yet it still got twice as many backers as this one.

2) There didn't seem like a lot of build up for this campaign. I remember hearing about the WL2 campaign weeks before it went live. So, people not only new about the campaign, but, the anticipation was huge. Then when it finally did go live, people couldn't wait to throw money at it. I didn't even know about the WL3 campaign until it went live. And i still don't understand fig.

If you were a previous backer of inXile's games, you were supposed to be aware of it. Email announcement went out a week in advance and we had early access to the campaign page, plenty of info to hype it up, etc etc.

 

[rune_74]

I don't personally care about the fact these aren't major stretch goals. My experience so far with most kickstarters is the stretch goals become increasingly harder for them to actually meet them.

Really think about it, how many actually get the things the goals in that they promise?

Pillars and Divinity both did not btw.

 

[ikbenrichard]

The backer numbers for WL3 speak a different story about how good WL2 was…

Seems so, didnt see that coming though.

 

[ChienAboyeur]

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I will be curious to see how well wl3 sells and if the investors do ok.
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Investors will do accordingly to the contract terms.

WL3 is going to sell well(except major disasters) The safety net is strong: they are seasoned professionals, meaning that they will release something. And that something is going to be dogmatically well received and hyped as one of the mandatory experiences to be had in the year of release.

It might dry up around WL 6 or 7. Up to that point, the sales potential is secure.

 

[DarNoor]

I wish these campaigns would do away with stretch goals. Just focus on the base game and any money above the initial goal will go towards an expansion or dlc.

 

[Dez]

Well they already secured the game's funding, so there is really no imminent need to donate. And If they actually needed more money than $2,750,000, well then they should have set the funding goal higher…

Besides Inxile is a well established company nowdays. I think many W2 backers have decided to buy their game when it is released.

 

[Moriendor]

Not necessarily. I think it says more about crowdfunding in general and the way people are starting to get burned out on it. Plus you can't compare it with WL2 because Kickstarter is far more popular than Fig.

Yep. The way I see it there are the following reasons for the relatively poor performance so far:

- Fig instead of KS
- WL2 did not meet everyone's "The Second Coming of Fallout" expectations
- Disgruntled WL2 backers e.g. the ones who had to wait months for their physical CEs to ship (even though inXile had a couple of years to arrange for production and shipping/handling etc.).
- Disgruntled other inXile game backers like e.g. Torment backers of the higher physical tiers who were at first excluded from Torment early access or who are not amused by the epic long delay
- The fact that inXile has a backlog of two games, i.e. Torment and BT4

I'm not sure if burnout really plays such a huge role. If you look at the D:OS 2 campaign, that one took off like a rocket and made more than twice than the original D:OS.
Or Battletech... Harebrained raised $2.7 million last November which was also a lot more than they got for the Shadowrun games (Shadowrun Returns $1.8 million and Hong Kong $1.2 million).
It doesn't seem to me like there is a general lull in crowdfunding but people are probably way more picky these days (I know I am, too ).