My biggest concern is his first game, Aeon Trespass: Odyssey . On Kickstarter, the base game costs $ 129. But now, if you hit the "promise late" button, the simpler game's price today is $ 299, more than double the original price. Since I'm aware of the current problems with creating and publishing board games in China, as well as the high price hikes, I think this is a much more realistic $ 299 to $ 129 price. But Aeon Trespass: Odyssey must yet to arrive. delivered to more than 8,000 original fans. And it seems to me that the original price was miscalculated; This may be understandable because COVID, the production / delivery crisis, and inflation cannot be attributed to inflation. However, I think their total value is more than the money raised on Kickstarter for Aeon Trespass.
Indeed, there is no "good" version of the interpretation of events here. They can deliver the game for $ 129, in which case raising the price to $ 299 seems like an easy rip-off. Or $ 299 is the real price with realistic branding, in which case $ 129 seems very out of place. It is not a big business that can eat without such losses. In other words, the money Kingdoms Forlorn is investing can now be used to fill some of the funding gaps in the previous project. It is very difficult to recover this funding from the Ponzi scheme, there is a big risk that Kingdoms Forlorn will also have even more problems with its funding until the end. And on Kickstarter, it's the fans who are most at risk. When something goes wrong, they can pay a lot of money for a game that never gets delivered. Of course, this is all pure speculation; small business finances on Kickstarter are completely opaque. Fans should pay attention to the red flags and be careful.
The second problem with Kingdoms Forlorn is the prototype status which has been sent to various YouTubers to play with. This is a fairly common practice. And yes, now you can become known as the Lord of the Rings. However, I've seen many Kickstarter campaigns offering prototypes of their games, and compared to these other prototypes, Kingdoms Forlorn is rather incomplete. A YouTuber enthusiastic about the game admitted that he spent 16 hours learning the rules. And there's a section on the Kingdoms Forlorn Kickstarter page that shows improvements to the prototype design. And somewhere my first concern returns: wouldn't it be better if they waited a few more months until the first game is released and the prototype is actually ready to play? It worries me when the * miniature * seems to be over and the game and rules are unexpected.
The base price of the Kingdoms Forlorn game, including shipping, is 170 euros ($ 190). Elite clothing, including delivery to Europe, costs € 250 ($ 280). Therefore, the game is not cheap and I would be very upset if the project does not pass or if the game is a gap. On the other hand, looking back, the Kickstarter prize for the previous game now looks cheaper. And the Kingdoms Forlorn campaign is one of those campaigns that includes multiple goals and a daily unlock, so you're promised plenty of goodness at the end of the campaign. It is designed to work with your FOMO (fear of loss) and it works. So I haven't made up my mind yet. There are red flags, but hope jumps forever; after all, that's how Kickstarter works. So far, all my Kickstarter commitments have worked well, so should I risk my money in hope? I'm not sure.
