Fandom Lounge's Journal - Day

9:53PM

If you're a gamer you've likely already heard of this, but if you haven't or you're not a gamer it's an interesting story!

Double Fine Productions, creators of the cult-classic game Psychonauts, and Brütal Legend, and headed by the man who made even more beloved cult games like the first two Monkey Island games and Day of the Tentacle, have just closed funding on the most successful Kickstarter project ever.

All funders knew when they pledged was this; with the money raised Double Fine would be making a new classic-style point-and-click adventure game, and funding a documentary of the game-making process. There is no plot yet, no characters, no setting, people pledging just did so because they trusted the company to make an entertaining game, or they just liked their past offerings enough to want to directly support them, or in some cases because they just wanted to help them give the middle fingers to the publishing middle-men who would have laughed a pitch for a point-and-click adventure game these days out of their offices. (Okay, and in some cases people pledged because they were really hoping that if people pledged enough the project might turn into Psychonauts 2). They set a goal of $400,000 for the game, just expecting to get enough to make a small but entertaining game.

The final total raised (admittedly before they find out how many pledges fall though due to lack of funds) ended up being $3,446,371. From just being a small game they've moved to being able to promise it's release on four additional platforms, in four additional languages, with voice acting for the English script.

The story took off all through gaming new sources after they crossed the million-dollar mark in the first twenty-four-hours after they started, but it quickly started catching on in the mainstream media as well. You'll find stories about it places like NPR, Forbes, or The L.A. Times. Stories quickly started coming out either proclaiming this the future of game development, allowing production companies to cut out publishers all together instead of needing to bow to their ideas of what would sell, or cautioning people that Schafer is a big name well-loved game writer and the crowds likely won't give so much money to just anyone; a good one to check out is Edge Online asking other developers what they think this project will mean for the future of the industry. Already people have started following in Double Fine's footsteps, with a Kickstarter project going up to fund a sequel to the RPG Wasteland, yet another cult classic, and Obsidian Entertainment considering starting up their own.

Whether it turns out to be a fluke or not, at least for the month and a bit it's been going on it's sent some interesting waves through the gaming industry. And, if nothing else, hopefully we'll end up with a very fun new game as a result!