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The Chainsaw Incident - Another fighting game being crowdfunded

Wow, that's actually the planned roster size?

I'm curious just how much money they're actually planning to spend on each character. Skullgirls needed $150,000 just to fund Squigly, who was already partially completed. How the hell do they plan to fund a 28-character roster, with multiple movesets for each character, on $275,000?
 
they where only aiming for 8 for the initial roster, still too low for it imo.
 
I guess that's better...? There's still no way they can fund it without making serious cutbacks to the animation and/or gameplay.
 
the reality is that not every fighting game needs to be as breathtaking as skillgirls, I would be fine with turbo hd remix level animation as long as the gameplay was good.
 
Mike_Z said:
Please show me what gave you that impression, I'm curious.

Re: 2006 SG - The way that game became the game SG is today was by replacing more than 4/5 of the development team, including everyone who made any gameplay decisions. Which was done well before asking for any money from anyone. In fact, after that point we worked for two years before even beginning to THINK about asking for money or signing the game. If you are in any way able to compare 2006 SG to this game, I advise you to remember that.
It was only due to how much I used to love 3d fighters before I dropped them from 2d. Its weird, they know what they want to do but dont have the proper terminolgy for it which why I say this. Oh and I used to hate SG with a passion so I didnt know that lol
Broken Loose said:
That's not the actual game. It's a mockup video and it still looks like shit. They were lying about it being pre-alpha footage.

Also, what about it looked fun? Did you make the same claim about Skullgirls 2006? What about the microtransactions, do those look fun?
Well I am dissapointed to find out that was fake footage. However the art style is what mainly caught my eye. And by microtransactions, do you mean stage transitions? I am an Injustice player and I sure do love those lol. Tell me though, how come you seem to be bashing the game so much? I will wait until they actually have something released before I make a new opinion of the game. And look back to mike z post when I said "I used to hate SG" lol
 
SonicFox5000 said:
I will wait until they actually have something released before I make a new opinion of the game.
They should have already released something before even launching a crowdfunding campaign in the first place.
 
Blaise said:
Sonic you were like 9 when it was 2006
u rite
 
Squire Grooktook said:
Microtransactions = payed for dlc.
damn im still a noop to crowdfunding terminology. inb4 I get blown up by broken loose on how stupid i am ;_;
anyways I wasnt even going to crowdfund to begin with lol. I just feel the game has potential and will wait. Thats all. I feel the creators know what they are doing even if they dont know terminology.
 
SonicFox5000 said:
damn im still a noop to crowdfunding terminology. inb4 I get blown up by broken loose on how stupid i am ;_;
anyways I wasnt even going to crowdfund to begin with lol. I just feel the game has potential and will wait. Thats all. I feel the creators know what they are doing even if they dont know terminology.

I'd have to say they probably don't know what they're doing outside of maybe art. They have some (mediocre, imo) art, and that's all. Should have had a competent game designer with a vision for the project before starting to advertise it.
 
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SonicFox5000 said:
damn im still a noop to crowdfunding terminology. inb4 I get blown up by broken loose on how stupid i am ;_;
anyways I wasnt even going to crowdfund to begin with lol. I just feel the game has potential and will wait. Thats all. I feel the creators know what they are doing even if they dont know terminology.
Not stupid, just uninformed in this case.

By microtransactions I mean the card pack DLC. The concept is pretty sickening-- tons of unlocks ("and more," hopefully this wouldn't have included actually stat boosts) were to be hidden in randomized packs of cards which you would purchase, and there were multiple different types of packs ("Guts Pack," "Throttle Pack," "Gold Pack," "Psycho Pack") that contained presumably juicier stuff. I'd go deeper into researching the possibilities but their fucking blog updates are hidden behind a paywall. Given that the company cares enough to mock up footage, mock up a purchaseable character statue, mock up a licensed arcade stick + cabinet, finish the cover for the artbook, and put together a vibrant and fantastically marketed Kickstarter page, I wouldn't put it past them to put dollars before sense with respect to the integrity of their DLC.

I'm vocal about this because this game is poison. It's flashy looking and designed to look good on the surface, but once you break through the glitzy exterior it's either scam territory or just awful. We deserve better as a community than to just be "handled" by having a Youtube personality plug a product with the expectation of converting us. I was actually incredibly critical of Skullgirls until I discovered that @Mike_Z was on board (and saw Peacock's design, heh) because he historically has a level of competence that assured me that the marketing wasn't just buzzwords. Even at that point, I still pulled him aside and was like, "Is there gonna be a limitation on normal jump actions like in MvC2? What about Y-Boost?"
 
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Just because they don't have a proper designer doesn't push them into scam territory imo.
 
Also missed this before but felt a need to point out

Cellsai said:
Arguably one of the reasons that killed the fighting game genre in the first place was a flood of sub par, badly thought out fighters on the market.

True, though I also suspect that arcades becoming an endangered species before the advent of any true online play to fill the void was also a very potent factor.
 
Grangach said:
Just because they don't have a proper designer doesn't push them into scam territory imo.

I think you might have missed a couple points there.
They don't have a designer, they don't really have any product at this point, the game is set to be full of microtransactions (ie paying for things after purchasing the game), their blog has a paywall, and they're asking for 275,000 dollars with nothing to really show for it.

I don't think they're like,
intentionally scamming with the intention of taking the money and running.
But it definitely feels like any investment in this would be a serious waste of money on the donator's part, which kinda makes it a scam.
 
I don't think that's the definition of scam. More like "you just got ripped off big time". An actual scam is more like criminal type stuff.
 
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I'm not sure what you mean by paywall, if you're talking about backer updates, those are pretty standard.

also how do I quote people? I'm new.
 
Thanks Cellsai. I'm just saying that I think these guys need to find their equivalent of mike z, someone who already works on fighting games or at least knows how to design them.
 
Grangach said:
I'm not sure what you mean by paywall, if you're talking about backer updates, those are pretty standard.

No, they mean that you can't even visit the developers website/blog without paying a separate fee to do so.

Grangach said:
Thanks Cellsai. I'm just saying that I think these guys need to find their equivalent of mike z, someone who already works on fighting games or at least knows how to design them.

True, but the point people are making here is that the fact that they didn't even bother to find someone like that up to this point seems to be evidence that they don't really care about making a good game. You don't start making a game with zero clue what you're going to do with it, than find a designer at the last minute after advertising it extensively and asking people to give you money.
 
To be honest, The Chainsaw Incident's visuals remind me of Warhammer 40,000. Not so much in direct aesthetic terms, but rather in the way everything is ridiculously over-the-top grimdark darkgrim spikey cutty bits. Like you can't even lean on a wall or anything because it'll flipping impale you and some architect thought that was a good thing. Also, I'm okay with all the character designs having some kind of unifying concept that brings them together in a way, mostly because I play miniatures games so I'm used to seeing 20-some-odd dudes that all look kind of the same, but everybody packing chainsaws is a bit silly. It's not made less silly by the combination of chainsaws and other things. A chainsaw scythe I'll grant you, because I run Lord Exhumator Scaverous when I play Warmachine, but chainsaw brass knuckles? A chainsaw genie's lamp? I can't take those as seriously as the designers apparently want us to. Also, there's this:
Every character will have a distinct, fully animated final super move...
I should hope that all the moves are animated. Otherwise it'd be Game & Watch: The Fighting Game.
And:
... customize your character into your own unique clone style.
Someone's gotta explain to these people what "unique" and "clone" mean, but now I'm just being unkind.
In short, F-- will not back.
 
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I think a large part of their problem is that they cant write for shit. It's not like they've never made a game before, granted they've never made a fighting game. I think they jumped into crowd funding way too soon, but that doesn't mean they couldn't potentially create something good down the line. Imo the art is really nice for a good chunk of the characters.
 
Broken Loose said:
I still pulled him aside and was like, "Is there gonna be a limitation on normal jump actions like in MvC2? What about Y-Boost?"
I don't recall you asking about Y-boost.
And anyway, look where Skullgirls got me. >.<

Grangach said:
Thanks Cellsai. I'm just saying that I think these guys need to find their equivalent of mike z, someone who already works on fighting games or at least knows how to design them.
(Regardless of whether or not they need that, that's a thing you do before you ask for money, IMVHO.)
 
"How do i maek gmae"- Chainsaw Incedent devs.

The art is creative and amazing, but everything else like the already mentioned braindead gameplay "features", use of buzzwords and the effing TRADING CARD BOOSTER PACK thing looks like a complete bombshell. I'd give it a month or two to start showing promise or else I'd just write it off as eventually becoming the Skyrim of fighting games when it's released.
 
Mike_Z said:
(Regardless of whether or not they need that, that's a thing you do before you ask for money, IMVHO.)

Not arguing there, they went in WAY to deep way to fast. Have they reached out to you mike? I'm sure you would have some sage advice for them.
 
For people wondering about the low amount of the minimum goal, it is only meant to raise enough money to fund a demo of the game which they presumably will show to publishers in order to get the full funding. You do have to dig through their pitch a bit to see this (it's mentioned in the stretch goal details). It does sound a bit shady, but this is actually really common for Kickstarter game campaigns. Most of them are not very upfront about it. This is why you see so many KS game projects getting stalled because they make a demo but don't find any publishers willing to take them on. This is also why the SG campaign had so much backlash about the goal; because so many campaigns severely understate their costs which has been distorting the public perception on the cost of game development.

(Case study: Neil Stephenson's CLANG campaign http://www.wired.com/2013/09/clang-kickstarter/)

Anyway, I have been private messaging the guy on KS. They seem industry-smart and are pretty passionate about their game. I don't think they are scam artists or anything like that. They just don't seem to be quite as smart when it comes to running a KS campaign, and they clearly know very little about fighting game development and the fighting game community.

But yeah, that isn't to say that the game is gonna be bad. It's just that there is absolutely zero proof right now that the game is gonna be good. If they can attract people who are willing to throw down money to support an expensive art project, that cool by me, but I am trying to talk to them to make them understand that they would have to seriously get their shit together if they want to appeal to more sophisticated backers.
 
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Considering how popular crowd-funding is for video games right now, and considering how much freely-available industry advice there is for crowd-funding games by people who have already done it and made mistakes, there really is zero excuse for the developers not having done the research and planning necessary to even give their campaign a chance of succeeding. Seriously, the campaign ends in 12 days and they haven't even reached 1/4 of what they're asking for -- forget about this being a scam, since they're not even going to get anybody's money. This is straight-up incompetence and it's painful to watch because the concept does have potential. Although, if they had any sense they'd either not make this a fighting game, or ditch all of the elements they're pitching that are inappropriate for the genre and would quite frankly not work.

Grangach said:
I think a large part of their problem is that they cant write for shit. It's not like they've never made a game before, granted they've never made a fighting game. I think they jumped into crowd funding way too soon, but that doesn't mean they couldn't potentially create something good down the line. Imo the art is really nice for a good chunk of the characters.

If they can't write for shit, chances are they can't code for shit. If you can't articulate how your game is supposed to play in the language that designers before you have settled in on then it means you don't actually know what your game is going to be like.
 
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gold163 said:
If they can't write for shit, chances are they can't code for shit. If you can't articulate how your game is supposed to play in the language that designers before you have settled in on then it means you don't actually know what your game is going to be like.
I don't know about that...but my first day in school I was told "A game designer needs to be able to communicate." ... so yeah.
 
Chrono_Tata said:
For people wondering about the low amount of the minimum goal, it is only meant to raise enough money to fund a demo of the game which they presumably will show to publishers in order to get the full funding.
This really should have been one of the first things mentioned on the KS page. How many people who backed this project knew that their money would be going into a demo?
 
This is offtopic but WOW.
Chrono_Tata said:
(Case study: Neil Stephenson's CLANG campaign http://www.wired.com/2013/09/clang-kickstarter/)
Ho-lee CRAP.

From that update the CLANG team posted:
"LESSONS LEARNED
--Kickstarter lock-in. Kickstarter is amazing, but one of the hidden catches is that once you have taken a bunch of people's money to do a thing, you have to actually do that thing, and not some other thing that you thought up in the meantime."

"Hidden catches"? Hot damn, we have to do what we said we'd do! How can anyone have the audacity to post that? I can't believe that's in an actual project update.
If I saw you were responsible for a project that said that I wouldn't hire you if you paid me to.

As someone working on a crowdfunded project every day and night with complete dedication, I am appalled that this kind of attitude exists toward the backers. You made a promise, people GAVE YOU MONEY, you damn well better deliver on that promise.

I guess I'm starting to understand why everyone wants to crowdfund things - there's a lot of money in it! All these failed projects I see have like $250,000-$500,000 backing, don't deliver anything, and then it turns out that with one well-placed sentence they never had to deliver anything in the first place.

No wonder people were so skeptical of SG.

/offtopic
 
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Verdant Brave said:
This really should have been one of the first things mentioned on the KS page. How many people who backed this project knew that their money would be going into a demo?
Yeah, the idea that they're only working on a demo seems to conflict with a majority of their Kickstarter. Their list of stretch goals clearly show that once they're funded at 275k, they have intentions of releasing multiple characters and stages, online modes, PS4 betas, and other stuff that they wouldn't need for a decent demo. Like Mike Z referenced in the article, they can't just back out of those promises if they have trouble finding a publisher.

What the Origo team should do is find some talented programmers and designers closer to home, and hire them to start pulling together a 2-character demo using the assets they've already made from their mockup animation. Then, if their pals in Japan were still interested, they could send them the prototypes for feedback. Once they have their "Filia Demo," they could pitch it to publishers, or swing back to Kickstarter with some more realistic numbers.

Anyway, it does look like they might be dead in the water at this point, so they'd better be coming up with some kind of backup plan.
 
KaboomKid said:
What the Origo team should do is find some talented programmers and designers closer to home, and hire them to start pulling together a 2-character demo using the assets they've already made from their mockup animation. Then, if their pals in Japan were still interested, they could send them the prototypes for feedback. Once they have their "Filia Demo," they could pitch it to publishers, or swing back to Kickstarter with some more realistic numbers.

I've already suggested this to them, and they don't see it as an option. I don't think they understand how much work it's going to take to turn this around. They want to do it on indiegogo, but I don't think that's going to help significantly.
 
People should be actively spreading the word to discourage people from backing this if it pops up again with the same terms as this campaign. If they want to crowdfund a demo they need to make that clearer, and if they want to crowdfund an entire game they have to have something to show for it beforehand or they don't deserve anybody's money.
 
Honestly the worst sounding thing about this from a gameplay perspective is that you can lose your cards, what if we lost a SG match and suddenly you were no longer allowed to use Filia combos and had to learn new moves that put you at a disadvantage. also how would this ever cater to the competitive audience?
 
Forget about the competitive audience; if there was a mechanic that screwed you over every time you lost I would imagine it would drive casual players away from fighting games even further.
 
DeathArcana said:
Honestly the worst sounding thing about this from a gameplay perspective is that you can lose your cards, what if we lost a SG match and suddenly you were no longer allowed to use Filia combos and had to learn new moves that put you at a disadvantage. also how would this ever cater to the competitive audience?
The cards are stated as extras (music, artwork etc. etc.) and that you had to bet them to lose them.
 
to be fair they're dropping the card system.
 
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Mike_Z said:
You, sir or madam, are the demographic they are marketing towards.
Do you also believe that Coke as a faceless corporation cares about how happy you are when you drink it? :^)

Remember there are many different aspects of making a game, in any genre.
I doubt many animators/character designers/modelers know what hitstop is, let alone grok most other aspects of fighting game design.
Your Right Mikey. It's kinds like how the people who made the first Mortal Kombat knew nothing on the art of perfecting a fighting game (which I will cut them some slack because back then making a good fighting game was like finding a person who likes Busby 3D Unironicly) and then they made "a billion monez cuz they haz the tweenz in their pool deck" and then they found out what they needed it to make it good. I will say they didn't have a good grasp on balance, but the people who made the remake made the game at least EVO worthy. So to make that shorter, Not everyone can make a well-balanced fighting game (I shoulda put Nintendo on here as an example, but back then Melee wasn't getting the EVO worthy-ness it got now and E-sports weren't that big back then, so it's not their fault that Brawl got a bad reception later on).
 
[offtopic]
Let's see...Mc.Rad joined Skullheart today and has BS personal info...

Mc.Rad said:
Your Right Mikey.
Gene Q said:
Try again Mikey [here]
Two people with an adversarial attitude, poor spelling and sentence structure, and random capitalization calling me "Mikey" within a few days when nobody has done that before ever? My money points to you being the same person. Professing opposite opinions, no less.
[/offtopic]
 
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Looking at the "footage" kinda makes me laugh because it is sooo awful to look at then in the new images you can't see anything, blind neutral, whoever sees eachother first wins
 
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