Only as much as a few short years ago, if a gamer were to say they were playing an “indie game,” one might expect them to say that as they were chomping on a gluten-free, vegan “TLT” (tofu-lettuce-tomato) sandwich with organic mayonnaise made from cage-free eggs while pushing up their hipster glasses and adjusting their emo scarves in July. Nowadays, however, indie games are losing their stigma, and many gamers are finding great hidden gems do not always originate from the big studios.
This movement from quiet, hidden, hipster indie game to a more general acceptance surged in 2014, thanks in part to crowdsourcing campaigns such as Kickstarter, Indiegogo, and many other fundraising platforms. Putting stories and ideas before the general populace of the Internet instead of a few bigwigs at a studio has put the indie in a more accessible arena than before, connecting gamers to games they want to play well before release.
Last year, those who joined in crowdsourcing's early days could finally begin to see fruits of their labors. Our 2014 choice for Best Indie Game, Shovel Knight, came from Kickstarter funds, and knocked our socks off (and the socks of many others). 2014 also saw the release of a new addition to the Divinity series, Divinity: Original Sin, the re-imagined MacVenture and NES classic Shadowgate, and the disturbing horror hit Among the Sleep, all funded by crowdsourcing.
It's a system that works, for those that are worthy of it – and sometimes those that aren't. Much of 2015's indie hits and misses will stem from 2014's campaigns. Check out some of the best (and worst) ideas from the world of crowdsourcing from last year, and you just may see some of these games in next year's “Best Of” awards.
The Best and Worst of Crowdsourcing 2014
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Blood Sport
Campaign Closed: November 2014
rnSuccessful: No
rnIs This a Good Thing: Absolutely.
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rnBlood Sport was not just a game, but a gaming peripheral as well. A really, really bizarre peripheral.
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rnThe two proposers of Blood Sport, Taran Chadha and Jamie Umpherson, wanted to “motivate the gaming demographic into getting involved in [blood] donation through our project.” An admirable cause, no doubt; hospitals and blood banks are always in need of blood donations, especially in times of disaster. Blood Sport proposed this by creating a game and device where damage in the game costs the gamer in blood.
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rnI repeat: this game would suck real-world blood out of you whenever you got hit. It sounds less like a game and more like a feather-brained scheme featured on Count Duckula. Kickstarter stepped in and suspended the campaign, and while they never officially said why, speculation was that it ran afoul of Kickstarter's policy against projects related to medical equipment.
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rnThough if it had succeeded, that would have been one hell of a game of Castlevania. -
Lovely Little Thieves
Campaign Closed: November 2014
rnSuccessful: Yes
rnIs This a Good Thing: I'm not sure...
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rnThe danger with crowdfunding for studios surrounds the possibility that your campaign may fail due to lack of interest. The danger with crowdfunding for gamers, however, lies in the fact that you may be financially backing something that will ultimately suck. Case in point: Lovely Little Thieves. Lovely Little Thieves touts itself as a “visual novel” where a group of spring breakers circa the 1980s get trapped in a supernatural house with 72 hours to escape. I'm in, says I. I'm a huge fan of Hotel Dusk: Room 215, plus I'm an '80s Baby myself. The campaign included a demo, which includes the first part of the “game.” Naturally I downloaded it and gave it a crack.
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rnSo far, I'm about an hour and fourty-five minutes in and I'm just bored to tears. There's no real animation to speak of, just 2D drawings of the characters, while main character Dawn prattles on about everything and nothing all at once. While the time setting is ostensibly the 1980s as evidenced by best friend Danielle's “Valley Girl” talk, the writing makes Hobgoblins look like an award-winning script. Every fiber of my being hopes that PangoDango Games uses the money collected to improve vastly on the demo, as the “game” launches in October 2015. -
Nevermind
Campaign Closed: October 2014 rnSuccessful: Yes rnIs This a Good Thing: Yes rn rnDedication to a project in the world of crowdfunding is sticking with it after an unsuccessful campaign. Erin Reynolds and her team firmly believed in Nevermind, attempting three campaigns before finally squeaking over the 75K mark in the fourth. Nevermind is a psychological horror game that utilizes biofeedback, where the game senses how scared, nervous, or stressed you are, and augments the intensity accordingly. Lose yourself, and the game will crank up the difficulty to swallow gamers whole. Show a brave, calm front, and the game may get weird, but not any harder. The idea of using biofeedback fascinates me, and could be a unique addition to many horror titles. It also ensures that with my scaredy-cat ass I'll probably never finish another horror title ever again. The horror title is scheduled for Early Access this month. -
Night Trap ReVamped
Campaign Closed: September 2014
rnSuccessful: No
rnIs This a Good Thing: Probably
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rnMuch like the B-movie schlock the original drew inspiration from, Night Trap is an awful game that, unlike Shaq-Fu, is so bad it's kind of good. I like it and feel deep-rooted guilt that I do. So when I heard that the creators wanted to remaster the game as Night Trap ReVamped, I readily gave them twenty bucks.
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rnClearly I was one of only a handful, as the project bombed, pulling in only about 12% of its lofty 330,000 dollar goal. The game, billed as an “interactive movie” featuring a vampiric family, an early '90s teen girl party, and a post-Diff'rent Strokes but pre-softcore porn Dana Plato, was one of the few titles to directly lead to the creation of the ESRB, so it probably was for the best the project wasn't successful, lest we have to deal with years of Congress getting involved in video games again. -
Pathologic
Campaign Closed: October 2014
rnSuccessful: Yes
rnIs This a Good Thing: Probably
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rnOne of the more common projects to be found on crowdfunding sites are the many reboots, remasters, and remakes to popular games of old. Sometimes great things can come of this, like the enjoyable remake of the classic MacVenture and NES title Shadowgate. Some… well, some were Leisure Suit Larry: Reloaded. Pathologic is a remake of a 2005 Russian adventure title that more borders along the lines of psychological horror, with players controlling three distinct characters to discover the cause of a mysterious and very lethal disease known as the “sand plague,” all the while trying to survive themselves. The game has never been properly released outside of Russia, but from what I gather, it could be a twisted joy to play. Pathologic is slated to release for PC, Mac, Linux, PS4 and Xbox One in late 2016. -
Thimbleweed Park
Campaign Closed: December 2014
rnSuccessful: Yes
rnIs This a Good Thing: So very much so
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rnLook at it. Just look at it. It... it is glorious. A brand new game, designed in the style of classic Lucasfilm/LucasArts games such as Maniac Mansion, Day of the Tentacle, and The Secret of Monkey Island, and it surrounds a Twin Peaks-esque murder in a small town known as Thimbleweed Park. Also, there is a cursed clown (serves him right) who cannot remove his costume or make up. Also, there is a dead guy named Franklin, who isn't sure how he died, but is definitely dead. It's the tradition Ron Gilbert and Gary Winnick are famous for, and it is appreciated enough to bring in nearly double the initial goal.
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rnWe likely won't see Thimbleweed Park until June 2016, but bet your bottom Kickstarted dollar it will be worth it. -
Treachery in Beatdown City
Campaign Closed: May 2014
rnSuccessful: Yes
rnIs This a Good Thing: Yes
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rnThose of us who grew up in the NES era were pretty lucky. We may not have had the greatest graphics in the 8-bit era, but damn if we didn't have some great games. Amongst the classic titles, we had some great beat-em-ups like Double Dragon, River City Ransom, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Arcade Game. We also had great RPGs including Dragon Warrior, Ultima: Quest of the Avatar, and of course, the iconic original Final Fantasy.
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rnSo why not enjoy both? Treachery in Beatdown City takes beat-em-up tropes and puts them in a turn-based RPG schematic involving a wild, over-the-top plot involving the kidnapping of the president characteristic of the side-scrolling brawler genre. The game is scheduled to be released in February 2015. -
Shaq-Fu: A Legend Reborn
Campaign Closed: May 2014 rnSuccessful: Yes rnIs This a Good Thing: Probably not. rn rnLicensed games, hoo boy. The practice has been around almost as long as video games themselves, and most of them suck hard. Occasionally, however, decent and even good licensed games would surface, such as Konami's Tiny Toon Adventures and Capcom's DuckTales and Chip 'N' Dale Rescue Rangers. rn rnShaq-Fu does not fall in that category. Shaq-Fu is a festering pile of dog crap. It ranks up there in the licensed bowels of hell with Friday the 13th and The Crow: City of Angels. The best thing Shaq-Fu gave us was a really good episode of Continue? In 2011. rn rnAnd yet, an Indiegogo campaign successfully funded a project to create a sequel, Shaq-Fu: A Legend Reborn. At least Big Deez Productions says they “won't FU it up” this time. Clever. rn rnNo launch date for the completed project has been announced yet, so there is still time to construct fallout shelters made entirely out of Atari 2400 Pac-Man cartridges.
