In the past month and a half, we have seen an incredible land rush to utilize Kickstarter to bring back classic game franchises. It started when Double Fine Adventure launched, and ended up raising over three million dollars. Leisure Suit Larry, Wasteland 2, and Shadowrun Returns soon followed. Are they riding the coat tails of Tim Schaefer? Who cares? That doesn’t matter — we’re getting a bunch of crowd-funded games by people who really care about the franchises. If they were looking for easy ways to cash in, they would be working on the latest Call of Duty.
DFA opened the door for many games to be funded on Kickstarter, and it is incredibly good to see that Mac versions are pretty much universally promised provided they meet minimum funding goals, and that is completely fair. The greatest aspect of Kickstarter, and the Internet on the whole, is that the lowest common denominator isn’t the only option for making money anymore. Niche groups can put their money where their mouth is, and make things happen. Sure, iOS haloing is happening, but the fact that Mac gamers can actually pledge money to get a game developed on their platform is a bit of a game changer.
How long until big game devs start promising Mac versions if they reach a certain number of pre-orders? It is an interesting time to be a gamer and a Mac user. I’m glad that I’m both of those things, and you should be glad if you are too.
