All posts by Matthew Faustini

Additional Pylons – Kickstarter Fatigue

Kickstarter is amazing. It’s a wonderful site full of ambitious (and not-so-ambitious) projects seeking funding to turn dreams into reality. Anyone can use it, from people looking to make chinos or make comics. It’s even brought fan-favorite shows back from the dead. And for some game developers, it’s a new way to succeed. Some game developers come to Kickstarter to fund passion projects, small projects just outside the means of the creator. Other come seeking big bucks, and, at first, it’s hard to fault them. Even Potato Salad can net you a cool $50 grand. Games are the highest grossing projects on Kickstarter to-date with a calculated $250 million successfully raised as of November 12th

But as more projects pop-up on Kickstarter (and other crowdfunding sites) the more we see projects failing to meet goals. It would be easy to say that these failed projects didn’t carry enough clout to succeed, but the problem is more elaborate than that.  Many of these projects are constructed by proven talents, have solid engines and entertaining premises, and yet they still come up short.

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Acquisitions Inc. – Dungeons, Dragons and a Live Studio Audience

It’s April 13th around 2:00pm at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center. Thousands of attendees of the Penny Arcade Expo: East (a convention better known as PAX East) have been in line for the past two hours or so for an event in the biggest theater the center has to offer. PAX East being a games-themed exhibition, you wouldn’t be faulted if you thought that this must-see event was showcasing a big-budget video game announcement or Q&A session. (There were a few of those as well.) However, the event that had so many folks lined up for so long consisted of five people sitting at a table and rolling some dice. Continue reading Acquisitions Inc. – Dungeons, Dragons and a Live Studio Audience

House Rules: Player-Imposed Challenge in Video Games

house-rules

When you play Monopoly, what happens when you land on Free Parking? Depending on who you ask, you get a different answer. Some say you get $500. Others say you get a pool of money collected by Income or Luxury Tax. Still others say that nothing happens. Why the disparity in answers? Welcome to the world of “house rules.”

Chances are you’re familiar with house rules. They’re prevalent in a great many card and board games. They add variety, challenge or are used to clarify unclear or ambiguous rules in games. But they’re not necessarily exclusive to just tabletop games.
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