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Air Dash Online (Indie game inspired by Smash Bros)

Well, to be fair, Air Dash Online certainly isn't the weirdest name for a game out there. You've got Spanky's Quest, Under Night in Birth, XEXYZ, Divine Divinity, Elevator Action, New Zealand Story, Tales of Legendia, Nuts & Milk...
 
KaboomKid said:
It's possible that the "Online" tag in the title might be hurting them too. If I was clueless and didn't watch the video, I might think this was another MMO game. I dunno about you guys, but I gloss over those hella fast when I'm flipping through crowdfunding projects.

When I saw the title I thought it was a fighting game based on Sword Art Online. That's a very bad thing. So yes, the title is not really helping them.
 
KaboomKid said:
Well, to be fair, Air Dash Online certainly isn't the weirdest name for a game out there. You've got Spanky's Quest, Under Night in Birth, XEXYZ, Divine Divinity, Elevator Action, New Zealand Story, Tales of Legendia, Nuts & Milk...
The title isn't popping in the cool way or weird way. It's vanilla.

I'm just spitballing, I have no idea on the story or anything

Battarias: Vengeance of Vaius
 
The "Online" part of the title makes sense. The game is aiming at hard-core melee fans, and since melee doesn't have online play, that's a major selling point for Air Dash.

... Then you realize that melee is over a decade old and online isn't a feature anymore; it's a requirement. So yeah, they need to at least drop that part.
 
Off-topic but...

KaboomKid said:
XEXYZ

Did you also watch Rushnerds video, or is it just an amazing coincidence that I've stumbled upon two references to this amazing cult game in just 2 days?
 
Squire Grooktook said:
Did you also watch Rushnerds video, or is it just an amazing coincidence...?
Rushnerds? Nah man, you're in Coincidenceville now. Time to dust off that Nintendo!

Speaking of which, it's sad that people are refusing to upvote Air Dash on the Greenlight page, not because of the name or the art, but because they think it's a Smash ripoff. I guess a game can't be original unless it's a first person shooter!
 
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KaboomKid said:
Rushnerds? Nah man, you're in Coincidenceville now. Time to dust off that Nintendo!

Speaking of which, it's sad that people are refusing to upvote Air Dash on the Greenlight page, not because of the name or the art, but because they think it's a Smash ripoff. I guess a game can't be original unless it's a first person shooter!

But with a better name, art style, and character design, people not only would've overlooked the whole Smash ripoff part but embraced it.
 
MysteriousJ said:
The "Online" part of the title makes sense. The game is aiming at hard-core melee fans, and since melee doesn't have online play, that's a major selling point for Air Dash.

... Then you realize that melee is over a decade old and online isn't a feature anymore; it's a requirement. So yeah, they need to at least drop that part.

Yeah I don't really get why they named it Air Dash Online... Sure air dashing is a new mechanic to platform fighters, but it's only a new tool that opens up new options not seen in a Smash game. However, fundamentally the core of the game isn't about air dashing, it's about sumo/king of the hill where you knock the opponent off the stage... so naming a game about one tool in a toolbox full of tools is strange to me.

Also they are aiming at hardcore Melee fans, but I'm pretty sure at the moment even Melee players like myself are scratching their heads...
 
A guy on the kickstarter comments may have just struck gold...
Dean Dadolahi-sarjoo said:
Is this going to be the PC indie smash bros. Are we going to have characters from indie games?
 
MysteriousJ said:
A guy on the kickstarter comments may have just struck gold...
I would actually really not want that.

Platform fighters are already shoehorned pretty heavily into the 'Must be a crossover game' corner. I'd like to see a game in this genre stand on it's own feet instead of relying on existing licenses.

On a totally different note, this Kickstarter has been so awful - especially the interaction and support from the devs - that I actually hope they cancel the thing before time runs out and put up a notice along the lines of, "We're sorry, but we're going to cancel this Kickstarter for the moment. Something came up that prevented us from actually working on this Kickstarter and so we're going to postpone it until things settle down. Thanks for the support and we'll see you again soon!"
The campaign is doomed at this point and they need to save face on this and saying something happened on their end (even if it's a complete lie) would help a lot in that regard.

Either way, my faith in this game's development has been rocked pretty hard by this campaign and has been moved into the 'Will be pleasantly surprised if it's ever finished in a decent state' category.
 
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These devs are really starting to bug me.

"We're canceling the campaign"

Thanks for the update. They built up 7k in pledges and they don't even give a half hearted explanation for what happened. On SmashBoards one of the devs was tip toeing on blaming the Smash Community for the failed campaign:

Yea, kickstarter is a fickle beast. After seeing the lack of response from the smash community, I don't think we can save it. We just have to scale back our goals for the next year and move forward accordingly.

Fuck off. They'll need a serious second attempt at a Kick Starter for me to consider putting money into this again.
 
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Compare this KS with shantae or mighty no. 9: even if there are different people, you don't need do be part of Inafune's team to send some artwork updates or make some hype on Twitter.
 
DukeMagus said:
Compare this KS with shantae or mighty no. 9: even if there are different people, you don't need do be part of Inafune's team to send some artwork updates or make some hype on Twitter.
What bugs me even more about that is that on their website they have a guy listed on the team for PR. They have a guy who's whole job is to advertise this thing and it still had nothing going.
 
Yep, I guess that's where this thing was headed. It really looked like these guys were expecting the Smashers to carry them, and that was likely their biggest problem. A new IP focused on one community is always going to have a lot of challenges. Even Project M has challenges getting Smashers behind it.

I bet they would have gotten a lot of useful feedback if they had just posted those prototype builds on their main website earlier, along with maybe their own forum. They just needed to do something to strengthen their community before the Kickstarter happened. Heck, Skullgirls had a fanbase before it was even a real game!
 
It needs more than reworking the artwork. They need a an artist with a very distinct and appealing art style
KaboomKid said:
Yep, I guess that's where this thing was headed. It really looked like these guys were expecting the Smashers to carry them, and that was likely their biggest problem. A new IP focused on one community is always going to have a lot of challenges. Even Project M has challenges getting Smashers behind it.

I bet they would have gotten a lot of useful feedback if they had just posted those prototype builds on their main website earlier, along with maybe their own forum. They just needed to do something to strengthen their community before the Kickstarter happened. Heck, Skullgirls had a fanbase before it was even a real game!

And they need a artist with a better sense of character design and a unique and distinct artstyle.
 
lightskintwin said:
They need a artist with a better sense of character design and a unique and distinct artstyle.
I agree that they need a more unique style. Personally, I still think they'd benefit from having multiple artists behind this thing, just like how M#9 did for its concepts. Having said that though, it's totally possible that the current look of ADO is more the fault of the client than the artist.

Maybe the director was so focused on getting flashy rendered pieces that he didn't give the artist enough time to sketch other ideas, or maybe the budget was so low that the artist had to squeeze the work into his off-hours. Making an iconic character can take a lot of time, so some problems might have just been due to poor planning, or a narrow vision of the product.

Anyway, they definitely need to rethink their approach to the game from multiple angles. I hope they pull together something better next time.
 
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KaboomKid said:
I agree that they need a more unique style. Personally, I still think they'd benefit from having multiple artists behind this thing, just like how M#9 did for its concepts. Having said that though, it's totally possible that the current look of ADO is more the fault of the client than the artist.

Maybe the director was so focused on getting flashy rendered pieces that he didn't give the artist enough time to sketch other ideas, or maybe the budget was so low that the artist had to squeeze the work into his off-hours. Making an iconic character can take a lot of time, so some problems might have just been due to poor planning, or a narrow vision of the product.

Anyway, they definitely need to rethink their approach to the game from multiple angles. I hope they pull together something better next time.

Anything is better than 3 pale skinny teenagers, a furry, and a demon. LOL
 
I'll do PR and drop some marketing related advice (remotely) if they're serious and take payment if successful.
 
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KaboomKid said:
Yep, I guess that's where this thing was headed. It really looked like these guys were expecting the Smashers to carry them, and that was likely their biggest problem. A new IP focused on one community is always going to have a lot of challenges. Even Project M has challenges getting Smashers behind it.

I bet they would have gotten a lot of useful feedback if they had just posted those prototype builds on their main website earlier, along with maybe their own forum. They just needed to do something to strengthen their community before the Kickstarter happened. Heck, Skullgirls had a fanbase before it was even a real game!

Definitely the biggest problem. The way they marketed this was pretty lackluster, setting aside the fact some of the game design looked questionable and the art didn't look very good. Sure the Smash community has thrown so much work and money towards things in the past, but they don't just blindly do it. You need to give them a good reason, and honestly the fact that the developers thought it was okay to show off the game for Kickstarter right now shows how naive they were.

Also seeing how some of the developers have experience from Project M makes me a bit uneasy. Project M is a great mod, but some of their game design decisions are a bit questionable, although to be fair the game is clearly labeled as a demo and is still being heavily developed constantly.
 
I KNOW THE SOLUTION!

Put Zeriam to make the PR for these guys. He f***ing made me support shantae! The man is quite the hype machine!
 
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I was just thinking about this game earlier today, and it seems that the twitter and greenlight pages haven't been updated since October, the facebook page has been taken down and the official website was not renewed in is being squatted. So RIP, I guess.
 
Yeah, I followed up on this a decent amount after it failed. The whole team folded pretty much immediately and the project was effectively cancelled. It was never officially killed, but all the team moved onto different projects.
 
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