Kickstarter, as regular readers of Nintendo Life have no doubt noticed, is becoming increasingly visible in the gaming media. It’s not just here that the crowdfunding site is gaining a lot of web space, as increasing numbers of fundraisers begin to emerge, gain significant support and, of interest to us here, often add 3DS or Wii U targets to their campaigns. In fact, the number of crowdfunded upcoming games on the Wii U eShop, for one example, is becoming as substantial as conventionally published titles.
The increasing prevalence of Kickstarter isn’t sitting well with all gamers, as is always the case with something new, and we’ve already tackled the “blurring lines” of fundraising goals, as we considered the case of Cloudberry Kingdom evolving from a plucky crowdfunded project to being published by games industry behemoth Ubisoft. TJ Lutz, Vice President of Pwnee Studios, kindly gave us his thoughts and said that a “number of small to medium sized publishers” use Kickstarter for “window shopping”, while insisting that even with the support of a powerful publisher, his team knew that their start was from hundreds of original backers. “We know where we came from, and we’re going to remain loyal to our backers no matter what,” Lutz made clear. “Without them Cloudberry Kingdom wouldn’t exist.”