Who is Funding ED?

[Celonius]

That ED raised more than SC on Kickstarter has no relevance at all really. My understanding was that Cloud Imperium only added the separate Kickstarter campaign to help those who, for whatever reason, were not able to pledge directly via the companies site. I backed SC as well as ED, but I've only ever backed ONE Kickstarter project.

So, HOW they raised the money really doesn't matter, the fact that SC backers have pledged over 40 million dollars thus far is what counts. And good for them, Chris Roberts and the Team seem a decent bunch, if a little less focused that Mr Brabens team IMO.

Btw: the entire MOON is fake...there is no dark side, the moon is like one of those houses we see in westerns with the fake front, the back is HOLLOW.

Scoob.

Of curse is relevant, only shows that when Elite starts their campaign have the same succes than SC. The difference is after. Braben does not need the money cause has a publisher who give him, thats why of course he earn less money by crowdfunding, because he decided that this was enough. You saw that when the kickstarter close, there were no marketing selling from Braben, in difference with CR who continues because he decided to do by his own. Anyway, the key is that E: D has the same or morse resources than SC. Actually FD has more resources to invest than CIG, and it's obvious when is a corporation who has financial investments. And as I said before, he has no need to buy new offices, start to contract new employees.

But hey, lets compare bot games: The Arena Commander and the Elite Dangerous alpha. Let's be honest, Elite: Dangerous looks like a Space Sim, not only in the space, also the ships, that is supposed to be more better and SC. When I played yesterday AC commander I felt like turrets in space. This awfull HUD... Sorry but this show me two things: E: D has more and better resources, and the team and vision of Braben is better than SC. Im just comparing the two gameplays to say this.

 

[Bob_H]

Might have been answered elsewhere but I am curious as to where the funding is coming from to get this game over the final furlongs.

It was a comment someone made on the forum the other day (cant seem to find it now) about ED now having raised X amount of millions but it struck me that £3 million will not last long on a game of this magnitude and also their was another thread about no publishers wanting to back it etc hence it went to crowd funding.

Not sure how many backers there is but even taking 60k @ £100 that's still only £6 million which again wont see this to the release day.

Is ED now being fully backed by publishers, investors (proper investors) to get it over the line?

Not meant to be negative, etc...Just never dawned on me that ED might be getting funded as it goes along.

As has been said elsewhere in this thread. David has said in the past that he already had private backing (figures between £20m and £30m have been bandied around but they are speculation) to make ED plus the Cobra Engine, which ED uses, has been in development and used in other games since at least 2004.

The ED kickstarter wasn't really to fund the game development but to prove to the private investor(s) that there really was a demand for ED and that FD could produce an ongoing franchise that people would buy.

 

[Styggron]

Please stay on topic everyone and if you wish to continue the SC chatter, please continue in the SC thread.

 

[Scoob]

Celonius: You seem very focused on the fact that in just ONE of the methods of funding, Kickstarter, ED did better than SC. Yet you then go on about all the other money ED has gotten.

What I'm saying is YES, FD ran a great Kickstarter campaign, that led to cementing the deal for additional corporate funding - not counting whatever FD had "In the bank" already. However, you can't dismiss the fact that the SC Campaign, did well too. They raised some funds via Kickstarter, like FD did, plus even more funds via another source, just like FD did. Chris Roberts actually said that he too had additional corporate backers lined up. They became even more keen as the crowd funding took off. However, in the end he stated that he did not need the additional corporate level backing, due to the overwhelming (you can't deny it) success of their campaign.

The fact that SC's "other" funding was a crowd-funded model on their own site - so, many smaller backers rather than (we assume) a handful of larger ones - isn't really relevant. BOTH companies have gotten the money they need to fund their vision of their respective games. BOTH companies are still seeing additional funding come in as more backers sign up.

I don't really get the whole "Frontier Developments have more Money than Cloud Imperium Games" thing. SC's funding is on their website for all to see, I don't think we have access to the exact level of funding the corporate investors have provided FD for the ED project. Maybe the suits have given FD and additional 40 million plus dollars, "beating" Cloud Imperiums totals - I suspect we'll never know the details - if true, this is GREAT news and can only be good for fans.

I agree that FD have delivered a more playable experience in the same time period, that's a given, However, FD have been more focused, whereas SC development is a lot more dispersed - something that traditionally pays off in the long-term, rather than short... or crashes and burns big time, lol

If FD have got such a huge pot of cash behind them for this project, I'm even more impressed by how focused they're remaining.

At the end of the day, Mr Braben seems pretty happy with how things are progessing. The Space Sim genre is certainly well placed in the public eye at the moment. I've no doubt the both the ED and SC campaigns effectively supplied backers for each others projects, and both raised the overall profile of the genre.

Scoob.

 

[beelbeebub]

TBH maybe some form of backing from MS game studios would be a good thing.

Before anyone goes nuts, here's my reasoning

MS would benefit if ED is a mega hit on the PC platform, even if only from the intangible kudos that would accrue around the PC as a platform

ED could be ported to the XBOne fairly easily, with some minor dumping down (mainly things like auto deploying of landing gear, no need to request docking etc) - leaving the core flight and trade/combat mechanic intact. As an exclusive it could be huge for XBone, sort of like HALO was for the original XB.

Finally, and this is the killer reason, ED is the perfect game for demonstrating MS's 'cloud computing' for games. Everyone has been sceptical of MS's claim that the shortfall in power vs the PS4 CA be made up by 'cloud computing'.

ED could benefit from sifting from the P2P model of networked play to a more solid system provided by MS. The NPC behaviour AI and flight could be done on MS central server and output to all player in the instances. The 'elastic' nature of cloud computing could result in instances increasing above the 32 limit (64, 128?) by dynamically robbing resources from under populated instances.

The players could benefit from better networked play, lower chance of cheating (clients are clients only, never hosts) and a more cohesive world.

TLDR;

I would not be adverse to MS investing and providing a server infrastructure, it could be good for the game

 

[Nomadski]

TBH maybe some form of backing from MS game studios would be a good thing.

Before anyone goes nuts, here's my reasoning

MS would benefit if ED is a mega hit on the PC platform, even if only from the intangible kudos that would accrue around the PC as a platform

ED could be ported to the XBOne fairly easily, with some minor dumping down (mainly things like auto deploying of landing gear, no need to request docking etc) - leaving the core flight and trade/combat mechanic intact. As an exclusive it could be huge for XBone, sort of like HALO was for the original XB.

Finally, and this is the killer reason, ED is the perfect game for demonstrating MS's 'cloud computing' for games. Everyone has been sceptical of MS's claim that the shortfall in power vs the PS4 CA be made up by 'cloud computing'.

ED could benefit from sifting from the P2P model of networked play to a more solid system provided by MS. The NPC behaviour AI and flight could be done on MS central server and output to all player in the instances. The 'elastic' nature of cloud computing could result in instances increasing above the 32 limit (64, 128?) by dynamically robbing resources from under populated instances.

The players could benefit from better networked play, lower chance of cheating (clients are clients only, never hosts) and a more cohesive world.

TLDR;

I would not be adverse to MS investing and providing a server infrastructure, it could be good for the game

Microsoft seem incapable of thinking of the larger picture like you though. I would have thought, with 10 odd years of online Microsoft consoles they would have implemented more of a crossover between their console platofrm and their PC software platform, but it hasnt happened. A strong PC market only benefits Microsoft after all, but they rather screw over PC gamers for the benefit of gains on their own hardware - see the Halo series as the first example.

Directly on topic, its a good question and I dont think the KS money alone would be enough to fund this game. Its just too big a game to be made for only a few million quid, and FD, while smaller than many, are not small like Egosoft for example.

Do FD's other games really provide enough extra income? Im not sure. Maybe David is making more of a personal investment in this than we even think he does.

Either way, I'm just happy we are seeing it happen, every day Im spending with the game is a happy day indeed.

 

[Scoob]

Hopefully, even with corporate backers, DB remains in control of the overal path development will take. I'd hate ED to be another game that looks great in Alpha/Beta only to be severely dumbed-down come release. Can't see that happening though.

Scoob.

 

[tooterfish]

ED could be ported to the XBOne fairly easily, with some minor dumping down (mainly things like auto deploying of landing gear, no need to request docking etc) - leaving the core flight and trade/combat mechanic intact. As an exclusive it could be huge for XBone, sort of like HALO was for the original XB.

The game already works with an Xbox controller, why would it need to be dumbed down?

 

[beelbeebub]

@tooterfish

Fair point,

Maybe, if they manage to streamline the flight control UI an Xbox controller will be sufficient. I currently use one but have things like super cruise, hyperspace, landing gear on the KB



Apologies for off topic

 

[Dante80]

Cheers Scoob

One of my main fears is not quite being able to get over the line and a big publisher coming in and offering to kick it over the line but asking for loads of influence for a small percentage of cash.

Think "Ransom Strips". The little pieces of land that go for just as much as the rest of the building project so they can get it finished.

Im hoping they can get this over the line without relying on a major publisher, although I also know having a major publisher on board opens so many doors.

The game is self published. After DB got burned with Gametek (twice), I really think there is no chance in high hell he is going to compromise creative freedom on this project.

 

[TheDoctor]

To be honest there have been a large amount of rushed buggy AAA titled games recently and hopefully any investor will now see the need to get a complete working game out of the door.

Even Watch Dogs got delayed for six months and still had problems which is down to the publisher.