again its hard to compare a kickstarter like Kingdom Come to Pantheon. Because Kingdom Come is 3/4 done with the game. Pantheon did not even begin. Youre taking about a project which probably cost upwards of $1 million dollars to make so far VS 10 dudes in their basement and a dell working on something in their spare time.
This is why proposals and business plans and KS are so hard... people can only typically see the product unless you shape a contextual message.
If you look at all the Kingdom Come: Deliverance media and presentation, their message isn't: we have an awesome game, help fund it. Their message is: big publishers want to change us or ignore us, and the only hope our studio stays open, our game gets made, and our dreams are realized is if you show our private investor this type of project is worth pursuing.
They emphasized the story behind the game to make it personal. It's no great secret this is how you get shit done. It's just hard, because you have consumers who will just focus on a product and nothing more if you let them. And you have developers, engineers, scientists, etc. who will also just focus on the product, if you let them. Somewhere, somebody with a greater insight, strategy, whatever, has to build an image of the forest so people appreciate the trees they're looking at and understands what they all add up to.
Ironically, the Pantheon KS is just focusing on trees and trees and more trees and literally on a live stream showing the dev lay down trees. That should all just be the vehicle to deliver the contextual message that gets people motivated and invested. If you go around various forums you can see people trying to talk about the message and story behind this project, but it's just a bunch of lone voices because you go to the KS and hear from the actual sources of the product and nobody is doing anything but talking about their own little tree that they're responsible for, and how more trees are coming, instead of the overall forest and trying to connect potential backers to any level of greater story, motivation, reasoning, etc. Just, hey, if you like the trees we're clumsily presenting in a vacuum, and half-assed as we can make them up, then why not pledge?
Right now, the only people pledge are those creating their own greater story/context to this project. That's not going to be enough. And as we talked about, reaching wider audiences, or convincing those how have created their own negative story/context, isn't going to happen by showing people a bunch of little trees with 'SLASH!' on them and hoping they build their own forest.
Have they really identified a need for Pantheon? Have they created an understanding and support that that need exists, much less needs addressed? Have they created a reason they should fill that need themselves? Have they created a motivation for others to trust they'll fill the need? Have they created a coherent idea that will address the need, a plan on how to make that idea reality, and reasoning why their final product/solution will successfully fill that need?
They've basically just said 'we want to make something' and hoped everyone else will answer all the questions for them and by luck or divine providence let them make the thing they haven't even explained why they feel it's so important it gets made, much less why we should help them make it.
