New MMO Crowfall

[francisbaud]

Recently surpassed $10,000,000 funding! :3

$10,000,000 is great, but I think it's important to remember what was said during Kickstarter:

"[...] we decided to go to Kickstarter and appeal to you, because we don't want to look for external money if we can help it."

"We clearly know how to raise money from publishers or from venture capitalists if we need to, but we don't want them dictating how the game gets made. We rather make the game for you."

They have also said that it would take about 6 million dollars to create Crowfall.

Now, only 30% of the total funding comes from the backers. The rest, 70% (7 million $) comes from:
- Perfect World (the publisher)
- AngelVest
- venture capitalists
- external investors
- founders' money (?)

[JamesGoblin]

You should doublecheck your data, just couple quick remarks: they control over 50% of money as planned per your quote and it'll stay that way, then - you confused PerfectWorld with Travian Games (PW is yet to give money), the $6M was nothing more but an estimate made during & immediately after Kickstarter in March 2015 and so on.

[Sam the Wiser]

The female models here don't impress me at all. Probably won't ever give it a try.

[francisbaud]

You should doublecheck your data, just couple quick remarks: they control over 50% of money as planned per your quote and it'll stay that way, then - you confused PerfectWorld with Travian Games (PW is yet to give money), the $6M was nothing more but an estimate made during & immediately after Kickstarter in March 2015 and so on.

If you have a source that could support your claims (except the one about their estimation that the game would cost only 6 million dollars to develop, yet they have raised more than 10 million dollars but are still looking for additional investment from venture capitalists and external investors) I'd like to see it.

The AngelList page seems to validate what I've written above. Google AngelList + ArtCraft Entertainment for more information, my forum account is not allowed to post links.

[JamesGoblin]

It's funny actually, your own quote is one of the sources you seek - just read it carefully. If you want to say that Gordon is a liar or anything like that, you'll need much more than assumptions and wild speculation.

[francisbaud]

Reading carefully changes nothing to the fact that you wrote:
- "PW is yet to give money" while Perfect World is listed on AngelList as one of the first 4 investors of Crowfall.
- "they control over 50% of money" without providing any source or reasoning to back up that claim.
- "you confused PerfectWorld with Travian Games" Travian Games is not an investor afaik. They've instead concluded a distribution deal for Europe with ACE.
- "your own quote is one of the sources you seek" No, in those quotes ACE tell their future backers that they went on Kickstarter to avoid external investors and venture capitalists because they don't want them to dictate how the game gets made. Yet, now only $3 M comes from the backers; $7 M comes from external investors, venture capitalists, possibly founders' own money, etc.

[JamesGoblin]

No, they are still negotiating with PW and spoke about that - "giving money" means something like $2M licensing fees they just got from Travian games. If you think that a company such as PW would give anything significant a year before game was even Kickstarted, then I have a bridge to sell you.

Speaking of the rest, it doesn't really deserve any comment - besides more inaccuracies, you are just repeating yourself, so it's already covered in my previous.

[ro9ue]

They just launched something with Indiegogo to allow small investors take part:

https://equity.indiegogo.com/offerin...1253&offerings

What is equity crowdfunding?

With equity crowdfunding, you get a financial stake in the company you’re supporting. Indiegogo and MicroVentures, two leaders in the crowdfunding and investing space, created an equity crowdfunding platform that allows financial investment in innovative startups. Equity crowdfunding has risks and you may lose all or a portion of your investment.

[Edge-]

They just launched something with Indiegogo to allow small investors take part:

https://equity.indiegogo.com/offerin...1253&offerings

Ye, I'm much more of a fan of equity crowdfunding compared to regular crowdfunding. The consumer assumes roughly the same amount of risk (technically more given the higher base investment of $100), but for a much potentially greater reward.

[Baelic]

Ye, I'm much more of a fan of equity crowdfunding compared to regular crowdfunding. The consumer assumes roughly the same amount of risk (technically more given the higher base investment of $100), but for a much potentially greater reward.

How is the return determined though? This obviously doesn't behave like your average stock market investment.

[jackofwind]

Isn't crowfall like 99% pvp. :/ those mmos always fail which is a shame because this otherwise looked good.

Yeah but servers basically exist as a long extended battleground, with specific set win conditions in each one.

It's a voxel game so everything can be destroyed, and servers have set lifespans, after which you will start on a new server while retaining all of the skills you've gained so far (but only the ones relevant to the class you choose count, and you can choose a new class at the start of every new server campaign.)

It's pretty different from your standard MMO setup.

[Deleted]

this game looks pretty great, if world of rngcraft keeps going as it is, with all the classes pruned to console levels then crowfall might be the way to go!

[Edge-]

How is the return determined though? This obviously doesn't behave like your average stock market investment.

Varies from game to game, I believe, largely based on the games performance if/when it goes live. I'd need to register and look into it more in this specific instance, but in general I find it a preferable method for crowdfunding that provides more incentives for the folks throwing money at crowdfunded projects. It's not treating it like a simple preorder for a product that may never make it to market, but as a proper "micro"-investment.

[JamesGoblin]

A bit of info from MMORPG.com forums:

'First of all, not negative on this it is kind of cool..The company needs to source capital and kudos for being innovative.

You however are buying stock in a company but not buying stock in a publicly traded company on an exchange. There is no provision at the outset for divesting yourself of the stock should you need access to cash and like a common stock there is no guaranty that you will ever be paid a dividend; no requirement at all.

I'm pretty "bullish" on Crowfall but there is a reason these type of investments weren't available to most of us for many years; they carry a lot more risk. If you like Crowfall and want to be a part of that story by all means, make an investment. If you are looking at this as a means to hit the lottery, you might think about setting up a monthly investment in a mutual fund. You would probably be better off.

The golden rule of investing: Never invest in anything you don't understand. Make sure you know how an investment works before you take the plunge. (and all of that is available on the site by the way. Give it a good read)

Please don't take this as specific financial advice. I'm no longer licensed and wouldn't want to do that... kidding aside, I saw posts on the indie site with people saying "I've never invested in anything before. Is this right for me?" Let me answer that. Nope, probably not a fit...'


Gordon Walton, Crowfall's Executive Producer, replied and confirmed this:


'This is an excellent summary worth reading for any non-accredited investor. The key difference now is that higher risk/less liquid investments are now open to non-accredited investors (i.e. regular people), but you absolutely should scrutinize these types of investments carefully so you can make an informed judgement. Accredited investors rarely invest money they can't afford to lose, and they are doing so in the hopes of higher than normal returns.

We offered this because a lot of backers asked for it when we first did our Kickstarter and since then.'


Source - http://forums.mmorpg.com/discussion/...omment_7073192

[prwraith]

Yeah but servers basically exist as a long extended battleground, with specific set win conditions in each one.

It's a voxel game so everything can be destroyed, and servers have set lifespans, after which you will start on a new server while retaining all of the skills you've gained so far (but only the ones relevant to the class you choose count, and you can choose a new class at the start of every new server campaign.)

It's pretty different from your standard MMO setup.

That kind of makes it sound worse honestly. So it's basically a long term battleground that keeps repeating over and over.

It's probably just me but I'm not seeing the fun there.

[jackofwind]

That kind of makes it sound worse honestly. So it's basically a long term battleground that keeps repeating over and over.

It's probably just me but I'm not seeing the fun there.

Numerous server types with totally different and very diverse goals. Every server map is procedurally generated, huge, and voxel-based. Each server campaign differs in length depending on what the goal is. Some might be 6 months long, and some might be 1 month long.

100% voxel. You can build a totally custom fort between two mountains to block access to part of a map, then the enemy can tunnel through the mountains to get around you, and you can destroy the mountains to collapse on top of them. Plot out your strategy on the world map and then get to work crafting, building, and protecting your shit alongside your allies in order to complete the server campaign goal.

It's like Rust meets Civilization meets Minecraft meets WoW.

To each their own. To me, personally, it sounds rad as fuck. What makes it even better is the deep crafting system, the unique rock paper scissors armor system, the unique skill/class system, the fact that players are lootable in PvP, and the fact that it's full action combat instead of tab targetting.

Honestly there's so much you ought to just look at the FAQ on their website. They go over everything in detail.

[JamesGoblin]

That kind of makes it sound worse honestly. So it's basically a long term battleground that keeps repeating over and over.

It's probably just me but I'm not seeing the fun there.

If your battleground is continent-sized, with thousands of players and months of duration (and if each new one is different i.e. unique due to procedural terrain generation) plus building/mining/crafting... the list goes on - then maybe the "battleground" parallel falls short to describe it well. Tho it gives some insight.

Another important feature are varying rulesets per server - from extremes such as free for all / friendly fire / full corpse loot to three factions (ESO, DAoC) or even to to PvP off in Eternal Kingdoms if the ruler / guild leader wishes so.

What will make Crowfall even more complicated are ties and traveling between different servers, be it Campaigns (huge "battlegrounds") or Eternal Kingdoms. These will be based on permissions (by players), cooldowns/queues or even rewards/penalties, because they don't want to lock a player into a server on a losing side, but they also don't want to let everyone just hop between servers 24/7.

EDIT: While I was typing, @jackofwind already covered it rather well.

[Gorsameth]

PvP territorial games tend to move towards a state of balance where several major factions control the land and are more or less at peace with each other, with the occasial period of turmoil. (See Eve Online for example)

The world aspect of Crowfall should do a good job in combatting this stalemate by hard resetting the world from time to time while maintaining the open world MMO feeling.


But if pure PvP games do not appeal to you then yes, Crowfall is probably not for you.

[JamesGoblin]

Speaking of Indiegogo - they just announced a somewhat spooky stretch goal - http://crowfall.com/en/news/indiegog...oal-announced/

[Post]

It sounds awesome, like I would love to be a thief that runs around stealing shit, being some sort of spy or something and selling it to my "side" to help them win the map or whatever. However I've heard about so many awesome sounding games that just weren't, that I won't get my hopes up. I'm expecting disappointment, because no other game has been able to provide me with that type of experience.