Friday, October 22, 2010

Another project funding site

Reader Dave Conklin of Oak Tree Games writes to suggest IndieGoGo.com as an alternative to Kickstarter.com for project funding.  He's got his own game, Virtue Cards, listed there for funding with a goal of $5000.  The Virtue Cards product is also available through The Game Crafter.

IndieGoGo looks like a nearly exact clone of Kickstarter, which is fine.  It seems to be well-established (about 11,000 projects active now; I can't find a similar statistic for Kickstarter).  A major difference is that on Kickstarter, if you fail to meet your goal, you don't get any of the money, while on IndieGoGo, you get to keep it even if you don't meet your goal, although with a bigger cut paid to IndieGoGo.  It's like this:

Site
Unmet Goal: 
You Get
Met Goal:
You Get
KickstarterNothing, Zilch, Nada, Squat95% of total pledged
IndieGoGo91% of total pledged96% of total pledged

That's a pretty big structural difference to how it works, and obviously IndieGoGo is going to get you some money no matter what.

My gut feeling is that Kickstarter is a little better established, and that posting there will connect you to more potential funders, but that either site would work.  We'll see how the Virtue Cards project goes.

Dave's project includes $3,000 to fund production of 200 copies of his game, which seems a little high to me.  For a 52-card deck, even with a nice box, I think you could do a lot better than $15 a copy.  Dave, if you're listening, let me know and I can send you some sites that might be cheaper, or get you more copies for your money.  PlayingCardsIndia.com, for one.

2 comments:

  1. Dave,

    Thanks for the shout out. FYI, you may want to fix the chart so that the column headers say "You Pay" instead of "You Get". Obviously the site takes the 9% or 4% and you get the remainder...otherwise it would be a *really* good deal for them. :)

    As far as the fuzzy math on the game copies...yeah, $15 per game is not my cost. That number is a round figure to take into consideration which supplier I wind up going with (got it down to 2), shipping from supplier, re-shipping to individuals, and a bit of a margin. All told, I don't think it is too far off.

    Thanks!

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  2. Good point on the get vs. pay - edited.

    Good luck on your game and your IndieGoGo campaign!

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