Why Crowd Funding Is Great.

Extended Title:
Why Crowd Funding Is A Great Entry To The Gaming Industry.


     Newer sites like Kickstarter, Patreon, and Indie Gogo are Crowd Funding sites; basically you pitch an idea and people give you money in support of this idea. This is a good entry for indie game developers because it takes out the need for a publisher. Games like Bloodstained, a Castlevania spiritual successor being developed by Iga (The creator of Castlevania) has made $5.5 million. Shenmue 3, despite being funded by Sony as well, has made $4 million. Of course this also applies to basically anything, books, music, making a potato salad (yes that is a real think that was Kickstarted, and it made $55,000).

     There are flaws to crowd funding though, there is no insurance for your funding because it is technically a donation. There are people that make hundreds of thousands of dollars and just go dark, there are game developers that make millions and don't deliver on the product. These instances seem to be few and far between though because many good things have come from and, hopefully, will come from Kickstarter. Pillars of Eternity being one of the biggest Kickstarter successes made almost $4 Million and was many websites Game of the Year.

     Crowd Funding is a great idea but comes with risk. It is great for indie devs looking for a way into the game industry and even older devs looking for a way back into the industry.