[Kickstarter] Project Eternity by Obsidian (Baldur's Gate, Fallout, Planescape, etc.)

Obsidian have been hinting at a Kickstarter project, and it is finally announced:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/obsidian/project-eternity

If you aren't familiar with Obsidian for some reason:

 

Bump for updates.

In the ~8 hours that the Kickstarter has been up, they've raised $600K+. I believe this shatters the 1st day numbers for some of the other large game projects (Double Fine, Wasteland 2, etc.). Kicktraq has it trending towards $18.8M, which I doubt will happen (numbers skewed by all the attention in the 1st day), but definitely nice to see all the support the project is getting.

Here's an interview with some more details about the project:
http://www.gamebanshee.com/interviews/109456-project-eternity-interview.html

 

Well...a lot/most of the Kingdom of Amalur team is with Epic now...and they usually get lots of cash money. Plus they get a much better logo with the new team.

Of course, those guys are only helping out on Infinity Blade now, but maybe they'll end up working on something like Kingdom of Amalur in the future.

 

Don't think they've said, but Obsidian already has their own engine I think (used for Dungeon Siege 3 IIRC). Unlike some of these projects (usually with new studios), Obsidian doesn't have to start from scratch, which might help them on that front. That said, Unity has definitely impressed me given what I've seen from other projects, and maybe that could be an option for them.

Other than that, funding would go into the usual stuff you'd expect out of a huge RPG. Lots of assets, lots of items, lots of quests, lots of dialogue/writing (including support for multiple languages I suppose), complex gameplay system, etc. Potentially tools/system to support mods. Hopefully support for Mac/Linux. Likely won't be a lot of money put into voice acting, CG/cutscenes, etc., especially since they require a lot of money and won't really improve the final product all that much.

Wouldn't be surprised if they were planning on putting in their own money, on top of the $1.1M (several other devs have done so...or said they would anyway). Seems like they've already come up with some art, gameplay systems, basic setting (and plot), etc. Plus, I'm assuming with a lot of these projects, they might be counting additional money once the game is released (they can receive publisher funding from that as well). In the end, they might only ask for $1.1M, but the game's final budget could be higher.

Though having said that, it wouldn't surprise me if they could get a great RPG done with that kind of budget. Looks like they'll have much more than that, but given how much experience Obsidian has with this genre and the resources they have available, I'm confident that they can do a lot with very little. No publisher meddling also helps (can add 20%-30% to the budget). IIRC, Fallout 1 was done with a ~$3M budget, and I think a large chunk of that was spent on the CG assets.

As for the 1.5yr-2yr estimate, that does seem a little optimistic, although without knowing what they've done so far, it is hard to say for sure. They were able to release games quickly back in the 90s (Fallout 2 was released a year after Fallout 1...of course, it could reuse a lot of stuff). I generally assume most of these projects will end up not hitting their original estimate, which is fine with me. I'd rather they took another 6-12 months polishing up the game (of course, hopefully they have money left for that). Plus, as demonstrated in the Double-Fine project (and likely others), when a project gets much more funding than expected, development should be expected to take longer in order to satisfy some of the new requirements brought forward by the stretch goals. A "barebones" Obsidian RPG could probably be expected by Apr 2014, but if they end up throwing in mod support, lots of languages, Mac/Linux support, more regions/characters/items/etc., the release would likely be delayed (all for the better of course).

I'm actually curious to see what stretch goals they'll have. Given that they're almost at $1M now, shouldn't be too much longer. Was kind of hoping they'd be full funded in 24 hours, but looks like they'll just miss that mark (as if ~$1M in 24 hours is anything to be disappointed about).

I really do like how Kickstarter has helped to bring back a lot of these projects. I think Obsidian mentions this in their interview, but publishers seem to focus on "big" games, which would require tens of millions of dollars (or more). This ends up leaving a gap in the <$5M range, and a lot of great games could be made with that kind of budget. Thanks to Kickstarter (and even digital distribution in general), that gap is starting to go away.

Though having said that, it still makes me wonder how publishers could not approve of projects like this (think something more like Dragon Age Origins, less DA2). This "dead" genre can apparently generate ~$1M in less than 24 hours. Wonder if we'll start seeing more games like this, even excluding projects from Kickstarter.

 

That list is so bad. At least as far as rankings go (e.g., name me 89 games better than Persona 4, let alone just RPGs). Just as a top 100 list, I guess it's OK, and your point still stands. BioWare, Obsidian, and their offshoots ended up creating most of the good "western" RPGs we tend to think about. Probably just need to throw in Bethesda and a few others to round out that list.


More updates. As you might already know (or expected), the game has surpassed its funding goal. Achieving the goal so quickly resulted in the following:
<iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/H-nUBcY6jQ8" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
That's Josh Sawyer from Obsidian (seen in the Kickstarter video). Actually doesn't sound too bad.

Also, stretch goals + miscellaneous info:

There's a video from Adam Brennecke accompanying the info on Kickstarter. Definitely seems like they're blown away by the support and had to scramble a bit to come up with some stretch goals. Guessing even these might be met pretty quickly (although I was hoping for a little more, but can't complain too much).

 

Bump for more updates, including answers to some things asked in this thread.

They're at $1.79M right now (still 25 days to go). They've had 6 updates in all for the Kickstarter. These include updated details about the game world, races, the "soul" concept they're going with, the technology of the world (including guns), the technology of the game (briefly), and more. Everything sounds great to me so far. They've also updated their pledges a bit, including a new "forum-friendly" pledge that would allow people to design/create an "Adventuring Company."

It turns out they will be using the Unity engine for the game. They like their internal engine, but the costs to license some of the middleware would be too great. Like I mentioned earlier, Unity seems like a fantastic engine, so definitely seems like a good choice. Partly because of this (and already hitting the Mac stretch goal I guess), Linux support is now a certainty, and is no longer part of any stretch goals.

Sounds like the game has been in pre-production for a few months, maybe since around the Wasteland 2 Kickstarter project was going on.

Some good interviews:
http://techland.time.com/2012/09/21/project-eternity-chris-avellone-interview/
http://www.vg247.com/2012/09/21/project_eternity_kickstarter_obsidian_entertainment_interview/

Earlier in the week, Obsidian's CEO had mentioned a discussion with an unnamed publisher who was offering to publish Project Eternity. In exchange for publishing the game, the publisher wanted the IP rights and and a share of the profits. And note, they wouldn't help with funding. Good old publishers.

A cliffhanger for the scheduled update on Monday:

 

Since this was bumped recently, thought I'd post again.

Lots of good updates since my earlier post. Almost at $2.4M now with 10 days to go. They've shown some more art, given more details on things like combat, classes, mod support, music, etc. Everything still sounds great. Only negatives I've really seen have been about the art, which at times looks kind of generic and uninspired, especially compared to art from other games (Witcher 2 seemed to be a good comparison). I somewhat agree, but that doesn't really bother me too much, especially this early in the process.

 

To add to what was said earlier, if for some reason you didn't back Wasteland 2, they're adding a copy of that with the $165 pledge (and up). Also get the first expansion for Project Eternity. If that's too much, but you still want Wasteland 2, you can support it here:
http://wasteland.inxile-entertainment.com/store

More new classes were revealed as stretch goals today, along with a goal to get George Ziets onboard (he worked on Mask of the Betrayer, among others).

If I heard right, they'll show off a screenshot on Thursday.

 

Oh wow. Love that screenshot.

Really would like another big city, though $3.5M seems a bit too much (unless they include paypal pledges in the upcoming weeks/months). The stronghold seems like a sure thing, and should be pretty cool. The lore update posted today was also nice.

If you guys want the expansion, or a number of other goodies, Obsidian did post a list of all their add-ons. Essentially just add $10, $15, $20, or whatever that add-on was to your pledge, and you can receive that item. I went ahead and did this for the expansion.

Really impressed by the Unity engine. This and other games look pretty good.