On Tuesday, Hi-Rez Studios, the developer of the popular third-person action multiplayer video game Smite, launched a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter to raise $50 million so that it can create a new game (or sort of) that makes fun of popular projects that have used the funding method.
The developer wrote:
“[In] gaming, perception is reality, and we’ve worked years on building a foundation to make reality our vision. [When] we learned of [Kickstarter], it was the perfect platform to fully explore our next vision. [We] are calling it – game. [But] what is game? 2d. [Open] world. [Resource] based. [Metroidvania]. [Visceral]. [Cinematic]. [Procedurally] generated. [Drivatar]. [Retro]. [The] cloud. [Dark] souls. [Game] is not a game. it’s an experience.”
Pretty poetic. Unfortunately for fans of the Hi-Rez, within 24 hours of its launch, the developer shut down the campaign and revealed the real reason behind the initiative – it’s just a joke:
“This project was cancelled due to extreme lack of interest in it’s ridiculous premise. It was a parody – mainly aimed at ourselves – as game developers sometimes take themselves too seriously and get a bit pretentious and buzzwordy with their ambitious goals.
“In all seriousness at Hi-Rez Studios we support both Independent Developers and Crowdfunding. There are many significant game projects that have been funded via Kickstarter and we ourselves heavily utilize crowdfunding for our esports prize pools.”
The company also shared a hilarious video for Kickstarter users to enjoy.
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