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Fully Funded on Kickstarter!

12 replies [Last post]
Wed, 02/23/2022 - 09:42
terzamossa
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Hello guys,
I have been very absent in the last period as things got crazy while launching and handling the second campaign for Kabula (first time we had to cancel!).

All was good this time, we did our homework fine and managed to fund in about 10 hours, went up for the first few days, slumped for the following week and now we hope it picks up again so we can unlock everything we want to fit in the game.

(we are not only hoping, I swear, we are actually working to make it happen hahaha)

Anyway, if you want to have a look at the campaign here it is, any support or feedback very welcome and if you have a friend who likes this kind of stuff please do send them over :)

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1142500370/kabula-0

Happy to answer questions on the campaign and anything around it!
I will start off by saying that a major difference from the first time was running lead ads on fb to collect a mailing list of people interested in the project BEFORE our launch :)

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Wed, 02/23/2022 - 11:23
#1
treeves3
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Congratulations!

Congratulations on fully funding!

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Wed, 02/23/2022 - 12:33
#2
terzamossa
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Thanks a lot Tom, much

Thanks a lot Tom, much appreciated :)

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Wed, 02/23/2022 - 16:46
#3
questccg
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Yes Antonio ... Congrats!

It's amazing with just over 300+ Backers and you have over 30,000 euros... I guess that works for some games with Miniatures and such... But I wonder if a CARD GAME could compete. Yes, Mind Bug by Marvin got over 300,000 euros but he got Richard Garfield involved with the game and that made a huge impact on what most of the Backers thought.

Didn't see a pre-campaign... Did you have any??? And if so, how many Followers did you have this time around?!

I know last time around you guys had over 1,000+ Followers ... Which sounded really amazing but only translated to about 100 Backers (which is unfortunate).

In any event, a second (2nd) TRY and voila... Success! Cheers.

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Thu, 02/24/2022 - 11:52
#4
terzamossa
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Thanks Kristopher! We had a

Thanks Kristopher!
We had a prelaunch page but only had 700 or so followers this time, we focused our efforts on the mailing list and that paid off: If you send a mail every 3 weeks, by the time you launch they know about the project way more that those who just clicked follow on KS! And now we'll write them again for the final 48h, in general it allows you a much better engagement.

Surely card games get less money per backer, but also they have waaaaay lower production cost, shipping cost and can keep a low funding goal.
Considering many card game sell for 19-25 USD I can say their percentual gain is much higher than what we can do with minis.
To be honest I wouldn't mind making a card game next time!

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Thu, 02/24/2022 - 17:26
#5
questccg
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Hmm... I'm not so sure about KS anymore... :-(

Sorry to say, but I think your game Kabula deserves upwards of 1,000+ Backers. This is a BAD SIGN from what seems to be the worry of making "Indie" Game Designers and their small-sized business any real sort of traction in the market.

I get it: you got people to up-buy with all the EXTRAS available to purchase.

I couldn't imagine doing so and this makes me wonder if Kickstarter is only for people with lots of money and games that require miniatures. I personally think the "Indie" scene is DEAD. Publishers like CMON or Cryptozoic Entertainment are making BIG titles and making a mint in the process.

The KS scene is nothing but big multi-million dollar companies making more games for the fans of their franchises. And TBH KS with their "Projects we love" ... Gives a cr@p about people making a ton of money than actually helping support "Indie" and smaller-type games which require less of a budget but don't make as much as mulit-million dollar titles.

Anyhow ... That's the way I see it.

Note #1: And, to me, it seems like KS glorifies all those BIG games with hundreds of miniatures and give them the "Projects we love" ... Because all they really do is INCREASE the amount of $$$ their 10% KS Fee earns... It seems like just a business now. And the business is about BIG companies making BIG projects! Unfortunately that's what it seems to me!

CMON alone have 48 successful million dollar KS campaigns.

https://www.tabletopanalytics.com/creator/cmon-219

Have a look for yourself IF you DON'T believe me... 48 Campaigns all grossing high amounts (maybe not all $1M+ but there are a LOT of over the $1M+ figure).

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Thu, 02/24/2022 - 19:00
#6
terzamossa
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they released their 50th

they released their 50th campaign last month!
Yes, anyway overall I agree, the real money is for big companies, and the original meaning of Kickstarter is almost lost...on the other hand these big companies became this big by delivering one project after the other and increasing their fan base, so I guess we can slowly start doing the same :)

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Thu, 02/24/2022 - 19:30
#7
questccg
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True and Correct!

terzamossa wrote:
they released their 50th campaign last month!

Like the Energizer Bunny... Keeps going and going ... and going... and ...

terzamossa wrote:
Yes, anyway overall I agree, the real money is for big companies, and the original meaning of Kickstarter is almost lost...

Yeah... KS has changed a lot over the years too. Seems like Europe is the HOT spot over the last year! UK, Germany and such...

terzamossa wrote:
...on the other hand these big companies became this big by delivering one project after the other and increasing their fan base, so I guess we can slowly start doing the same :)

That's the think about Kickstarter: if you ALREADY have a FAN BASE, you can DO WELL! The problem is most "Indie" Designers are UNKNOWN and TBH many "Indie" Game Designers are working home alone in their basements subcontracting to the people who will get the work done.

I'm not over-glorifying the lifestyle... I mean I don't wear no GOLD around my neck! Hahaha! (LOL)

So yeah IF you have a CROWD of people who like your games... Well then like you say it is much EASIER to GROW your fan base.

But I fully agree with all your statements. They sound TRUE and CORRECT to me!

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Thu, 02/24/2022 - 21:27
#8
questccg
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Talking about GROWING a fan base...

About 5 years ago, it would be easy to get 250 Backers for an "Indie" Project. That would be my benchmark ... But today, I see that this is UNDER 50 Backers! It's pitiful how poor the Backer pool has become. It takes a LOT of VISUALS to motivate Backers to believe in your game. Before all you needed was a GOOD game and to post a "rulebook" and Backers would BACK your game ... Because they liked it ...

That was TradeWorlds. Unfortunately OLG went from 1,500 Backer for Tau Ceti and then 1,000 Backers for TradeWorlds and lastly 500 Backers for Trench. They were just doing campaign too quickly and not completing everything before trying again for more. Not that is is necessarily wrong... It just didn't work correctly.

Usually you may want to wait 1-Year between Kickstarters to give your Backers the chance to evaluate your game and the rate it. And then if it is all good, you can get the chance to TRY AGAIN at another KS. I think OLG just spread themselves too thinly with too many commitments that hurt the company and its reputation.

Anyways I'm still working with Stan over at OLG for the fulfillment of TradeWorlds... It's almost been 5-Years since the KS occurred. So we are in process of finishing this project (finally).

To me, there is no GLORY in Game Design. I do it because I like it and I am very good at it. I get a lot of ideas, most I dismiss but I still have some future ideas that I will pitch soon enough. But I think we (me & my Family) have decided that Kickstarter with the 0.0001% rate of success is no longer an option. So I will be moving on to a different venue and wait a bit longer to see how that works out.

In a way it is good. I didn't want to WASTE money on Facebook Ads. Just for a campaign that will fail because it is TOO "Indie". I'm not even a TEAM anymore, I work alone and subcontract to Illustrators, Graphic Designers and Creative Writers (Sci-Fi for TradeWorlds). I guess I was just hoping to grow the business into something that could be made for a TEAM!

I guess you are the opposite: you've got a TEAM now all you need is PROFITABLE projects! I haven't a clue how you got people to film you playing with your friends & family... The video was very professional. Like I said you DESERVE over 1,000+ Backers. Sorry to see so few coming to your party...

Cheers... And hope you get a few more Backers in the last few days!

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Sun, 02/27/2022 - 23:15
#9
questccg
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I backed at the 1 euro level

IDK if any of this interest me or not (actually being honest) I'm not very interested by this game (TBH)... Like IF maybe you offered some custom dice for 5 euros or something like that. Maybe that would encourage me to spend a couple extra bucks!

Like I said, you guys deserve 1,000 Backers. And we all know NOW why this is not happening (You guys are too "indie" for the Backer-crowd).

We all know and see how KS has gone from "indie" to MONEY-ORIENTED (Projects we Love ... Are all about cash-grabs and the amount of monies that are funded). It's not really about the quality of "indie" games...

So while you may only get like 400 Backers ... It's better that 320 Backers which you were stuck at for at least a week! Cheers.

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Wed, 03/02/2022 - 05:42
#10
terzamossa
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Thanks for the support

Thanks for the support Kris,
the campaign needs to be oriented towards people who are excited about the game, offering things for people who are not interested in it would be almost counter productive in my opinion.

I think your arguments against KS being too focused on money are too focused on money, if this makes sense hahahha. While I totally agree that most of KS backers support big companies to get mainstream products, if we are considering the goal of KS to be "Kickstarting" a project, then that is exactly it did to us.
We can now afford manufacturing and have a good half of our first print run effectively prebooked through KS, which means the project is becoming a reality, which was the main goal of the campaign, at basically no risk for us.
In this terms KS has proven extremely effective.
If our goal had been to become rich, then yes it did not work, but was this the goal of Kickstarter as originally meant? Making creators rich?
I guess it wasn't only backers who shifted their point of view (and are now focusing on big companies) but also creators did (as they look at it as a way to make a lot of money, instead of a mean to make a dream a reality).

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Wed, 03/02/2022 - 16:00
#11
questccg
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Well what I agree to is this,,,

terzamossa wrote:
...As they look at it as a way to make a lot of money, instead of a mean to make a dream reality...

That's for Big companies. And it is true, making dreams a reality has long gone by the wayside when it comes to Kickstarter. They almost "exclusively" give the title of "Project we Love" to those who make the most monies in the first 48 hours...

Not COOL INDIE projects that have a great game and nice art.

But then again... All Projects have cool art and amazing videos too. And the game is probably very subjective (some will like, others will not).

However I still feel an INDIE game like Kabula should have gotten over 1,000 Backers. That it made less than HALF that amount ... Is well... Disappointing. I know you guys are happy and all (that it did fund), it's just not as interesting from a Project perspective.

I'm not thinking about "getting rich" or "making a lot of monies"... I was hoping to be able to squeak by enough monies to LIVE and not require this to be a side-hustle. There is a difference between making a living and becoming rich and then there is not making ANY monies or even worst going into the RED to finance other game projects. I'm in the RED about $35k CAD... so far.

And this NEW "Kickstarter" sucks sh!t with their policies to favor Big Companies and making them all "Projects we love"... Sure you LOVE them, they make a TON of money.

Believe me, I am not focused on the Bottom Dollar. But still making this gig a full-time job in which I can SAVE a decent amount of monies to live by... Is not happening right now and I've got to plan for the future. At the moment, I am planning part-time employment to cover my expense so that I can continue to design games and hopefully sell a design and recoup my latest investment.

Anyhow at least Kabula Funded. Cheers!

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Thu, 03/03/2022 - 02:49
#12
questccg
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BTW in case anyone is interested in KS Records...

Here is a website that will show you the TOP Earning Kickstarter Campaigns:

https://www.tabletopanalytics.com/topgrossingarchive

And you can click on CMON to see that they have 50+ campaigns with many over the $1M dollar funding amount. My guess is that CMON are probably around $50M in gross revenue from KS initiatives.

That's a lot of money folks...

Just sharing with you the stats and you can take a look at some of the other companies that have made a LOT of monies on KS.

Cheers!

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