Tim Schafer On 'Outpouring of Love' Through Kickstarter and Why Publishers Aren't 'Jerks'Tim Schafer of Double Fine just might be at the forefront of a new business model. Kickstarter itself isn't new, but the speed and mechanism of funding a new game project has been inspiring for a number of independent developers. In under 8 hours, Schafer had already hit his goal for $400,000. When IndustryGamers sat down with Schafer at the DICE Summit last week, he had raised another $25,000 in the span of our 25-minute interview! He explained to us how he's been stunned by the incredible response.
As of this writing, Schafer's adventure game project stands at more than $1.7 million, which is about $1 million more than when we spoke with him. " I was more surprised than anybody. It's not like a large number of people. Somehow they're just giving a lot. It's been really inspiring. It's like they're giving me – I'm trying to think of something to say that doesn't sound corny – it's like an outpouring of love. All of the comments are just really supportive and our fans are the best... and they're going to get what they asked for. That's the greatest thing. We didn't have to ask permission from anybody, except for the fans," he enthused.
"I'm not vilifying or saying publishers are evil... I don't think that they're jerks – well some of them are, the ones that sue us."
We asked Schafer if the new adventure game would be a spiritual successor of sorts to one of his old adventure classics. He wasn't ready to unveil any significant details on the game just yet, however. He did note that even though he's not working with a publisher, he's still under pressure to deliver, and he feels that obligation, particularly to the incredibly supportive fans.
"It's an adventure game, so it'll have some of that legacy, but I think each one of those games was incredibly different from the ones that came before it. Grim Fandango bears no resemblance to Full Throttle. I feel like, with this group, it's like – if I took money from a publisher, then I'd say, 'Hey, publisher. You're going to risk all your money on me. I'm going to try my best to make you some money.' That's the not lose your money and hopefully make you some [approach]…but to my creative self and my team and my fans I'm like, “I'm going to make a great game.' So for the fans, I'm saying, 'I'm going to make the most awesome game possible.' And I feel like the obligation is to be as creative as possible, which is a really unique force to have. It's intimidating that I think the audience for this is going to want us to go nuts and do something really, really creative and not play it safe," Schafer explained.
Perhaps we'll see a spiritual successor to Full Throttle?
So again, while Schafer is not beholden to a publisher, he certainly needs to make a profitable game, partially to prove that this Kickstarter model is an effective one too. "Now the reason to make it profitable is that we want to do this again. We want to show that it works. It's not a charity; it's a business plan. Just an innovative business plan, and we want to make them work and do more of them," he said.
Schafer made headlines recently by noting that publishers are generally to risk averse and scared to support creative new IP, and that's potentially a drain on the industry. At the same time, however, Schafer made it clear to us that he's not saying publishers are an evil force.
"I'm not vilifying or saying publishers are evil, or that they're not doing what they should be doing. It's just it's inherent in that set up that they risk a lot of their own money and, therefore, they need to invest in mitigating that risk and there's a cost or a burden with that risk mitigation that affects development in a negative way. But I don't think that they're jerks – well some of them are, the ones that sue us. But, there are great people at the publishers, they're making a lot of money, they're doing the right thing for themselves," he said.
Schafer continued, "But I think for Double Fine, our MO is we like to make up a lot of stuff. We like to make up new worlds and characters and we like to come up with new ideas, and so that goes against that kind of risk mitigation because when you sand off all the sharp edges and you curb your ideas just to play a safe thing and that's not what we want to make. This is allowing us to make things and to take risks – every game can be totally different, like Happy Action Theater; it's completely different than anything we've made before and anything that has been made before and I think that's what people who really like our company want us to do. They don't want us to play it safe."
We'll have more insights from Schafer soon. Stay tuned.
