Kickstarter

For those who don’t know, Kickstarter is what’s known as a “crowd-funding” website. It allows individuals looking for funding for various projects to get together with interested investors. What usually happens is that the fund-seeker gives several different “levels” of support as options, each with its own particular reward. A reward for a relatively low donation might be getting your name listed as a supporter, while a higher donation might get you a free copy of the game, and a very high donation might get a monster named after you. It’s not just for games, of course, but it’s most definitely used to fund games; RPGs as well as boardgames.

The key is that, unless the project reaches its stated goal, the money you pledge is safe. So if it’s looking for $10,000 and only raises $1,500, you get your money back. Pretty spiffy.

Purple Pawn has taken it upon themselves to do an interview with a bunch of different game designers who used Kickstarter to fund their games. They asked questions of both people who were successful in making their goal, and those who were not:

For those of us in the RPG hobby who might be looking for funding for a gaming project (and remember it doesn’t have to be the whole project; you could easily do a Kickstarter campaign to raise money for, say, artwork or the cost of printing) this is an invaluable insight into the way Kickstarter does, and doesn’t work.