Yasha 13 Oct, 2016 @ 1:37pm
I've always been a fan of RPGs, going back to the paper and pencil era. It took all my political clout and influence at MicroProse to get the project started. I'm also an academically trained historian, which helped inspire the topic and the approach to it. You can see echoes of Traveller and Runequest in the Darklands design, although the setting was totally original.
The problem with making a modern sequel is money. A decent-looking and playing RPG is NOT cheap. The amount of content for RPGs is staggeringly expensive (lots of art time for world building, character creation, animation, etc.), not to mention all the game data and game logic. If you want it playable online (an MMORPG), that roughly doubles the game programming cost, and adds a whole business-software layer to handle monetization (whether subs or F2P style cash shops). As a producer with solo game and MMO experience, I know the level of effort needed. The classic indie mistake is underestimating the work required, but not realizing it until you've burned through your money and are only half done, at best.
People I know have tried crowdfunding game projects. With a few rare exceptions, most projects can only pull in 0.5 to 1.5 million dollars, assuming they even succeed to that degree. I calculate that I'd need at least 10 million to staff a team for 2 years to build the a Darklands sequel. Therefore, for a modern version, I'd have to find a "white knight" who was willing to invest multiple millions in a core team. That team builds some early demos to attract most of the remaining funding. Crowdfunding helps validate the project (or help us find how to change it) and provide additional money for marketing and reserves. Steam Early Access might play a role in the final phase of testing and financing near release.
It is possible that such a "white knight" investor might be a game publisher. Unfortunately, I don't know of any publishers who would be interested. Even in the heyday of MMORPGs, publishers were very leary of projects that didn't have a big license to generate nice sales estimates from the marketing department.
