Guncraft to Test Kickstarter Feasibility

It’s one thing for a company like Double Fine to use Kickstarter to fund a project. They have an existing fan-base, respect in the community, and a knack for making fun games. While their Kickstarter has been impressive, Double Fine is still an established company, a company that has already proven itself. Can this success be replicated, in any form, with an untested company? Well the guys, all four of them (Edit: Sorry!) at Exato Games, making Guncraft hope that it can.

Guncraft is an FPS game in a voxel style (cube shaped) world. The game will combine the constructible/destructible cube-like terrain seen in Minecraft with traditional faced based FPS style gameplay.  By their accounts, players should be able to, “kill someone by destroying the ground underneath them and dropping them to their untimely doom.” They also have something called “prefabs,” full structures custom-made by players that are useable in-game. Sticking with the FPS theme there will be multiple game modes, leaderboards, and clan support, if they raise enough.

They aren’t Double Fine, so the in order to reach their goal of $16,000, Exato Games has spoofed (below) the popular MW3 “Vet and the Noob” video. It’s pretty funny, and it has created some buzz for the game. Also, they have offered some pretty insane rewards for those who choose to make pledges in the higher tiers – $10,000 gets you an Associate Producer credit in Guncraft and “EVERY GAME WE EVER MAKE…EVER!”

This is a test for Kickstarter. Sure, it can raise money for Tim Schafer and an adventure game from Double Fine, but can it raise money for an original idea from a company no one has ever heard of? So far Exato has made almost $2,000 since opening up their Kickstarter 3 days ago, and with 27 days left it is very possible that they will reach their modest $16,000 goal. With the help of Kickstarter they hope to have a Beta in March, with a full release by June for PC.

Edit: My apologies to John Getty for misspelling Exato Games.