How important is a robust social network to any crowdfunding campaign? Ask Toby Turner.
Turner is a YouTube sensation. His three channels (TobyGames, Daily Vlog and Tobuscus) boast over 10,000,000 aggregate subscribers. TEN MILLION. His videos have been viewed over 2 billion times. YouTube also pays through AdSense in-video ads, so it’s safe to assume that Turner has built a nice living off of his videos.
His most popular channel, TobyGames, was #20 on TubeFilter.com’s most viewed channels list last week just below Justin Bieber’s VEVO channel.
Thanks to his enormous exposure, Turner just closed an Indiegogo campaign that netted him over $640,000 to develop a video game based on Tobuscus Adventures, a popular web cartoon that features a likeness of Toby Turner.
TubeFilter has stayed on top of the campaign and points out that Turner isn’t the first YouTube star to raise big cash via crowdfunding…
Turner now joins the ranks of other online video phenoms who have raised incredible amounts of funding from the crowds. The Lizzie Bennet Diaries raised $462,405 on Kickstarter in April 2013 for a DVD of the entire series and a mini-season before the next modern video interpretation of a Jane Austen novel. Hannah Hart collected $223,007 in February 2013 on Indiegogo for an epic road trip around the world. And Freddie Wong amassed $808,341 in February 2013 during the Kickstarter campaign for a second season of his web series Video Game High School (which was after his Kickstarter for Season 1 raised $273,725).
Toward the end of the campaign Turner lowered prices for every tier in his campaign by 20%. The campaign garnered over 10,000 Facebook likes and over 6,000 comments.
In the game, you cast various spells of murder doom upon the incoming zombie armada. To cast a spell, Tobuscus must draw the spell symbol on his spellbook (which is, naturally, a touch-screen tablet. He is a modern wizard).
Due to overwhelming support, the game will be released on PC, iOS and Android.
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