We Got Over The Bar!

Post #16

I suspect that a significant number of you here on this Substack, are already backers for the Kickstarter, which means you already got the backer update. So, my apologies for doubling up your inbox, but for those of you who aren’t backers, I want to let you know we just got funded!

Some of you may not be very familiar with Kickstarter, but the way it works is that people don’t actually spend money until a project gets over their funding bar. They simply “pledge” money. If the bar isn’t reached by the end of the 30-day campaign, then the project gets $0, and everything is off. Generally, no one gets rewards either, although I was going to do my best to get at least some of those rewards out to everyone.

The good news is we don’t have to worry about that now. Everyone gets the rewards and things can chug ahead as planned. Also, just because we passed the funding-bar doesn’t mean it’s over. Needless to say, the more we can generate the better, which is why we have stretch goals. Some projects generate quite a bit more than their “ask-amount”, and it all helps to get the project done, and get additional features in.

People run Kickstarters for 2 main reasons, the obvious one, of course, being the money, and the other… visibility. This isn’t just the visibility of the Kickstarter Campaign itself, but all of the social media and any press, Steam reviews, demo, etc. that happen in the process of doing the Kickstarter. Some funders view the Kickstarter as a bit of a litmus test. They like to see that you can get funded before they invest, so… getting over that bar is more than just getting the money.

As you can easily guess, I am in the midst of using all of this visibility to search for longer term funding for this project, as we still have probably about 10 months or so (that’s my best guess right now) to go before we are at a point where we can release, and that’s just on Steam. I also want to be able to go to mobile and to Switch and maybe even to other consoles. I also want to port to other languages, Thai being the first, and I want to have some professional voice acting, and maybe in VO in Thai as well. I doubt if I will be able to afford VO in other languages, but we’ll see. This Kickstarter money allows us to continue production while I keep pounding the pavement for full funding.

Good Steam reviews are helpful… if you have already left one, thank you. If not, maybe you’ll have time to do that.

If you happen to have a line into anyone who might be interested in chatting about investment in the game (private, or professional game funding), please feel free to tell them about a deeply worthwhile and heartfelt project ;) and give them my email address: greg@humanaturestudios.com.

I plan to keep this Substack going after the KS campaign is done too, and keep you all posted, both on progress of the game, and on my thoughts in general. It’s the first blog I’ve ever done, and I hope you find it interesting to read. It’s a place where I can share a bit more detail in a relaxed way, and let myself say whatever comes to mind, more than the more focused Backer Updates.

I think I’ll stop here for today. As always, let me know if you have any questions, and thanks for reading these posts. I’ll come up with something fun to share for the next one. Holler at me if you have any questions!

Time to go have some ice cream and and maybe play a game and relax for a little bit before jumping back in again.