Just seen Kickstarter... Wow.

Deleted. Cheers Dino.

It's in the announcements subforum.
viewtopic.php?f=11&t=6612

Dwamies wrote: ↑

Thu Sep 27, 2018 2:28 pm

As to that 180k, if we say he needs 30k/year to live on, he is now out of.

Just remembered I made this post. I hate it when I'm right..

Lol, a few of us thought the same two years ago and we were probably right then!

I doubt it. If Kickstarter takes 10%, then 10% of $180,000 still leaves Josh with around $160,000. Even if we take out a good deal for Adam and Francois, that still leaves us at around $100,000 (and that's with unreasonably high expectations of how much they were paid). If he used up all $100k in 4 years, that's $25k per year, which means he would've been living off of $50k the past two years - and it's ridiculous to think he would've had $50k worth of personal savings. Nobody has that much money saved up at 20.

Well perhaps it was 12-18 months ago we had that conversation not 24. But TBH it was just a comment LOL you/we are actually just making up assumptions we don't know how much his costs were, how much he spent on rent, cars, food, drink, women lol nor do I or any of us for that matter

Yes most 20 year olds only have a few quid in there back pocket (if there not in debt with a college/uni loan) so by that standard he only had about a tenner to put in the hat?

As Josh mentioned personal savings and I'm thinking he meant more than a few quid but how much more we really don't know.

I'm not a backer (would liked to have been) and please don't get me wrong I liked Josh and really liked his transparency despite the teething problems and mistakes. However after failing to make the game I feel that if I was a backer I would want more transparency with how the money was spent...after all it was backer money!

I can't imagine how much more transparent anyone could have been than Josh on this project - he said right at the start it would be for some software and costs of, e.g. music production, but the rest was going on living expenses while he worked on LT.

You could ask for receipts or how much his rent was, but you know what, I think that he did everything to make it last six years, and I'm bloody impressed. Honestly, if he had called it quits after two years, I would have been equally comfortable with his spending, but the guy went so much further, as in all things he did, trying to achieve perfection.

I believe that under these circumstances, we have absolutely no right to even question his budgeting. Josh did us all proud with what he put in to making this, above and beyond and mere pledges we may have made, and he deserves praise and full credit for it, not arguing about whether he should sell anything to give someone a few dollars back.

Mate, if your a backer and happy with the way things went then, as a non-backer, how am I to question you?

HAPPY DAYS

I didn't take it as you questioning me or whether I'm happy as a backer, Starbuck, no worries mate

My only point is that in this specific case, I think Josh has already been highly transparent in where the money went, and indeed stretched it way beyond what I ever thought my $45 pledge would be able to manage.

Ringu I could be wrong but I thought a $45 dollar pledge was to go towards a game, alpha/beta access and perhaps some dodgy art work or something like that?

As far as I know (and I don't know so perhaps you can correct me ) but you've had none of that right?

If that's the case then how did this process stretch your $45 pledge way beyond what you thought it would.....are you saying you never expected a game? LOL

Now I know you may come back with something like: Loved the ride and the process, it was great fun making friends, lots of fab conversations and digitally meeting new people but you don't need to spend $45 for that surely...you expected a game right?

Starbuck, I understand your perspective. However, I think most people here stopped being here for the game a long time ago. At some point, people began to appreciate the journey. For many, the journey became more to them than the actual game would have, if it came out. All of this came about purely because Josh's Kickstarter was funded: these exist - every friendship built, every fond memory - exists because people funded Josh's Kickstarter.

I (personally) place more value on a single friendship than I do any number of games. Games are fun, yes, but at the end of the day, they're just games. I've made friendships here that will last lifetimes, and people are much more dear to me than a game I'll tire of after some number of hours.

People here have watched and experienced Josh's triumphs and struggles to get the game completed, and even though he failed, there was more than enough content (in the form of devlogs and dev videos) to constitute several movies' worth of entertainment. Given a movie ticket can already be about $10, and a novel $20, it's not hard to imagine people that paid $25, or even $50, think they got their money's worth. Perhaps, no, it isn't what they originally wanted... but they got something out of it nonetheless.

I think this is what Ringu is explaining. (Please correct me if I'm wrong!)

Starbuck wrote: ↑

Sat Oct 06, 2018 3:40 pm

Ringu I could be wrong but I thought a $45 dollar pledge was to go towards a game, alpha/beta access and perhaps some dodgy art work or something like that?

As far as I know (and I don't know so perhaps you can correct me ) but you've had none of that right?

If that's the case then how did this process stretch your $45 pledge way beyond what you thought it would.....are you saying you never expected a game? LOL

Now I know you may come back with something like: Loved the ride and the process, it was great fun making friends, lots of fab conversations and digitally meeting new people but you don't need to spend $45 for that surely...you expected a game right?

Fully agree with Talv. Let me repeat in my words, for emphasis:

Why do you want a game in the first place? For entertainment. You play a game for fun, to have fun during your free time.
If I look my steam statistics, there are some games (3-4) where I reached 80-100 hours of play (top scorer is 116h, and I actually got it through Talv here!!!). These are absolute exceptions. Normally it is more like 20-40 hours (game I loves) to few hours or minutes (game I was not hooked by). I am not playing many multi-player games (I guess long ago - no kids at that time - when making Halo games with friends, it would have been much higher; but LT is also not multi-player).
So buying a game is buying the expectation (say 50% chances) of some 20-40 hours of fun. This is a lot. Going to a movie for 15Fr is buying me 2 hours of fun, so by this measure, a game could cost 50% * 30h * 7.5Fr/h = 112.5Fr...

What did I finally get, from my kickstarter pledge of 30-odd Fr?
Hours of devlog video coverage that made my days; dozens of hours of develog reading; hundreds of hours of interaction with this nice community. And the reactivation of an old hobby of 3D imaging is directly due to the LTFC contest, so indirectly to this pledge - hundreds of hours again, at least.
Man. All that would be worth so much more than my pledge. Orders of magnitude. This pledge has been one of the best monetary investment I ever made!

So again, so much thanks to Josh for the dream, the entertainment and thanks to Talv and the others for the community! This is also why I am absolutely willing to pay hosting or whatever is required to help keep this place alive!

We bought the hope of entertainment, and we got plenty of it. Pledge fulfilled!

Starbuck wrote: ↑

Sat Oct 06, 2018 3:40 pm

If that's the case then how did this process stretch your $45 pledge way beyond what you thought it would.....are you saying you never expected a game? LOL

Tal and CSE are absolutely correct in that I first came to the forums to complain about the dark days, because I badly wanted a game I could play. Entertainment, as has been said. The community here, and especially some of the people, turned out to be worthy of admiration in my view and I am honoured that they all accepted me into their ranks despite the DOOOOM I was spreading at the time. I've had some amazing conversations here, and shared in some awesome ideas and just plain fun banter, that had someone charged me $45 for, I would have paid gladly.
So yes, that is perfectly true.

I did also mean the simpler form in that Josh's campaign and comments made it very clear that we were paying for his living expenses most of all, so in making our pledges last for *six years* instead of the one year original estimate, he went way beyond our expectations at any reasonable level. Almost all throughout, he gave us devlogs of breathtaking scope and grand visions on an epic scale. This turned out to be great entertainment in its' own right, and I feel very strongly that this journey has been the next best thing to getting the game.

As a developer of long standing, I am fully aware of how projects can fail so I'm not so heartbroken at the lack of a game that I can't appreciate that Josh tried his best, and I feel that he made every good faith effort possible.

If Josh had done something like Jonathan Blow does: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1TEQ5MAvCrA I would have paid good cash money $$$ to Patreon/Twitch or whoever(for Streaming LT development ).

Hopefully Josh will create a video: 'how to compile the LT source' or at least a detailed txt.

Has Adam said anything?

Also, I'd really love to play the PAX demo's!