Terminator 2 Kickstarter BEGINNING NOW!!!

[Bowflex]

I'm not so sure. Does popularity really equate to willingness to back a kistarter? Seems like the same 2,000 donate in each kickstarter.
How much do you think Addams will need? $100,000 or maybe even $125,000? Could be a lot of dough.
I'll dig deep for TAF. I really want that one.

I am guessing it will be between 75-90k. We should start a thread with guesses and see who can be closest without going over. I definitely agree there is a pretty large core of backers that will donate regardless of the project. However I also know that Addams will bring a larger pool of donors and a lot more excitement with it. People that donated $10 or $20 will be putting more in for this one. I wonder what will happen if they can't get it underway by October 1st? Will they do an alternate kickstarter or perhaps try a lower-cost premium table without a kickstarter in a standalone release (like TZ or ST:TNG but without a prior kickstart).

 

[Baltimore Jones]

Yea I feel like Addam's Family would have the easiest time of any of the TPA Kickstarters so far. Even many non-pinball fans will have played TAF at some point and would be nostalgic enough to donate a bit. I will say that if I had never heard of TPA, seeing a news item on a gaming website about a TAF Kickstarter would have gotten me excited and interested. Granted, that's partly personal preference but the table was hugely popular, objectively speaking.

Simpsons/Family Guy would probably attract enough of a new audience to succeed at any reasonable price.

 

[Shaneus]

I'm worried about a TAF KS. Pretty much because since it's the one table that basically everyone (except myself, I'm not that big a fan of it TBH) will back, there won't be much/any incentive for future tables to get licensed. Hell, you saw the struggle with T2 and that was AFTER they name-dropped TAF on the main page.

 

[Kevlar]

I played TAF for the first time a few weeks ago and really couldn't see what the fuss is about. I'll back any kickstarter they come out with but I don't think the community is going to support many more. FS need to come out with a different strategy to fund these tables, maybe do one licenced table at their own cost and charge whatever they have to as an experiment to see if people buy it or not.

 

[Rudy]

I'm worried about a TAF KS. Pretty much because since it's the one table that basically everyone (except myself, I'm not that big a fan of it TBH) will back, there won't be much/any incentive for future tables to get licensed. Hell, you saw the struggle with T2 and that was AFTER they name-dropped TAF on the main page.

Which is why I think the winner of the licensed tables poll will be picked as a stretch goal from the start.

If they can partially fund the next table then it'll be easier to fund the next table. Alternatively, if they can FULLY fund that table they might be able to add an extra stretch goal.

 

[Mark W**a]

I'm not so sure. Does popularity really equate to willingness to back a kistarter? Seems like the same 2,000 donate in each kickstarter.
How much do you think Addams will need? $100,000 or maybe even $125,000? Could be a lot of dough.
I'll dig deep for TAF. I really want that one.

I can't imagine it would be more than T2. I obviously don't know but I mean how could it? Arnold is one of the biggest movie stars of all time, and Terminator is one of the biggest film franchises of all time. I can't imagine an Addams Family license costing anywhere near as much, let alone more. Obviously we won't know for a while but my guess right now would be between 40-50,000 basically the same price as Twilight Zone or Star Trek.

 

[Sumez]

I'm actually really surprised Twilight Zone would be that expensive.

 

[TomL]

I'm actually really surprised Twilight Zone would be that expensive.

Popular = expensive to license.

 

[Sumez]

I didn't realise Twilight Zone was that much more popular than, say, universal monsters or Harley Davidson. I think the people owning the licenses are probably just b****es

 

[Sean DonCarlos]

I can't imagine it would be more than T2. I obviously don't know but I mean how could it? Arnold is one of the biggest movie stars of all time, and Terminator is one of the biggest film franchises of all time. I can't imagine an Addams Family license costing anywhere near as much, let alone more. Obviously we won't know for a while but my guess right now would be between 40-50,000 basically the same price as Twilight Zone or Star Trek.

It'll almost certainly be more. Nine separate licenses according to Bobby, and even if he's managed to convince Raul Julia's estate to allow his voice/likeness to be used, I can't imagine the estate will do it cheaply. Even if Paramount Studios only wanted $20K upfront, and the other eight entities only wanted $10K, that's still $100,000. And the fact that there are nine separate licenses means that there probably wasn't a blanket deal in place on the actor rights like there was with ST:TNG.

I played TAF for the first time a few weeks ago and really couldn't see what the fuss is about. I'll back any kickstarter they come out with but I don't think the community is going to support many more. FS need to come out with a different strategy to fund these tables, maybe do one licenced table at their own cost and charge whatever they have to as an experiment to see if people buy it or not.

If everyone actually puts their money where their collective mouths are, The Addams Family would go through easily, even at $100K or more. The Simpsons Pinball Party and Lord of the Rings would probably also make it on their own popularity, assuming the license costs weren't astronomical. Beyond that, I think the crowdfunding pool would be tapped out. Pinball players have been besieged with kickstarters, and not just from FarSight: PAPA, Silverball Studios, and that proposed museum in California have all passed the hat recently.

I'm actually really surprised Twilight Zone would be that expensive.

For a nearly 60-year-old property, Twilight Zone remains very popular. And I'm sure CBS did their homework and realized "hey, the Twilight Zone pinball machine is really good and really popular, we should be able to get top dollar for this!" (I'm not saying CBS screwed FarSight. It's just business sense that when you have hot property, you ask more for it.)

 

[Kevlar]

If everyone actually puts their money where their collective mouths are, The Addams Family would go through easily, even at $100K or more. The Simpsons Pinball Party and Lord of the Rings would probably also make it on their own popularity, assuming the license costs weren't astronomical. Beyond that, I think the crowdfunding pool would be tapped out. Pinball players have been besieged with kickstarters, and not just from FarSight: PAPA, Silverball Studios, and that proposed museum in California have all passed the hat recently.

Exactly, Like I said I will back them all I just don't think the community as a whole will stand for more than a few more, I hope I'm wrong, or that FS change try a different strategy as there's way more tables that will require a kickstarter than is realistic to expect to get funded. Maybe FS need to get better at negotiating.

I asked a question before but no one gave their opinion, out of the machines listed in the licenced tables poll could any of them be lumped together for a multi table kickstarter? Maybe they share agents or film companies/actors?

 

[netizen]

Enough with the second machine as the stretch goal ideas. Remember the back lash against STTNG as the stretch goal in the TZ KS? adding it made for almost no increase in pledges, but a huge increase in *****ing.

What needs to be added is a transparency issue. Something like: it costs x for Y hours of programming and debugging code on older tables.
Everybody has bugs they want to see fixed, older scripted tables they'd like to see emulated, features implemented. But the constant clamour for "New and Shiny" makes it very difficult for FS to ever work on those bugs that make the other part of the community complain even louder.

Give Us what we want, a new licensed table, and a massive bug patch, and give FS what they need the time and money to get these things done.

1st stretch goal|: Emulate BK
2nd stretch goal: fix cv
3rd stretch goal: implement native controller support in Android

etc etc

 

[Sean DonCarlos]

While I understand the thought process behind this, I can't see myself, much less the masses, paying to have bugs fixed...and I'm the one here who tracks them.

 

[TomL]

I didn't realise Twilight Zone was that much more popular than, say, universal monsters or Harley Davidson. I think the people owning the licenses are probably just b****es

Pthth. If I was selling something and buyers turn up at my door shouting "shut up and take our money!", of course I'm going to set the price as high as someone is willing to pay.

For a seller to underprice what the market will pay, makes as little sense as a buyer overpaying the stated price.

Do you buy a car and offer to pay *over* the price the dealer wants?

 

[Matt McIrvin]

I have to admit that I don't give a damn about the Terminator 2 pinball table (despite the fact that I'm normally a Steve Ritchie fan, and the movie is a classic). But The Addams Family is another story entirely; if they got as far as an actual Kickstarter it'd be really attractive.

As I said earlier, in real life TAF managed to utterly fascinate my daughter even though she's never otherwise heard of The Addams Family in her life. The gameplay and theming hit some kind of undefinable sweet spot of near-universal appeal. The emulation would have to go all the way, though: no replacing Raul Julia's voice.

Back when the Twilight Zone Kickstarter was going on, I figured there were basically three tables that could sustain a licensing Kickstarter: TZ, Star Trek: TNG, and The Addams Family. I'm surprised that Terminator 2 did as well as it did.

 

[Sumez]

Enough with the second machine as the stretch goal ideas. Remember the back lash against STTNG as the stretch goal in the TZ KS? adding it made for almost no increase in pledges, but a huge increase in *****ing.

People keep bringing this up! I wasn't around then, can anyone explain what exactly this backlash was? How can anyone have _anything_ against STTNG? It's an amazing table, and perhaps even more importantly, not really like any other table out there.

 

[Matt McIrvin]

People keep bringing this up! I wasn't around then, can anyone explain what exactly this backlash was? How can anyone have _anything_ against STTNG? It's an amazing table, and perhaps even more importantly, not really like any other table out there.

It wasn't that people didn't like the table. It's that a bunch of fans of it kicked in some money for the Twilight Zone Kickstarter, not for Twilight Zone but for Star Trek: TNG; and it then became clear that the Kickstarter wasn't going to come anywhere near making the stretch goal. Unlike a primary goal, failure to meet a stretch goal doesn't keep you from getting charged. So they felt like they'd been cheated somehow. It was all good once the Star Trek Kickstarter happened and the leftover money lowered the bar, but this was before any of that.

For that reason, stretch goals need to be relatively realistic.

 

[netizen]

People keep bringing this up! I wasn't around then, can anyone explain what exactly this backlash was? How can anyone have _anything_ against STTNG? It's an amazing table, and perhaps even more importantly, not really like any other table out there.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1067367405/pinball-arcade-the-twilight-zone/posts/238560

 

[Sean DonCarlos]

People keep bringing this up! I wasn't around then, can anyone explain what exactly this backlash was? How can anyone have _anything_ against STTNG? It's an amazing table, and perhaps even more importantly, not really like any other table out there.

Twilight Zone hit its goal very early on - about 15 days in - and ST:TNG was announced for the second table. A bunch of people who were uninterested in TZ but interested in ST:TNG donated. But there was confusion over what would happen to the "excess" money if the main goal for TZ was reached but the stretch goal for ST:TNG was not, as people who donated to TZ for ST:TNG would get TZ-based rewards that they didn't want. When it became apparent that the ST:TNG stretch goal wasn't going to make it, people who had pledged for ST:TNG started backing out, which caused some uproar.

 

[Rudy]

But the problem with Twilight Zone is that presumably Farsight had no idea how big it was going to get, so didn't even consider a stretch goal from the start. If they had changed some of the reward backers to say "oh for $30 you get Twilight Zone AND ST:TNG should it get funded" and "for $10 you get a choice of Twilight Zone or ST:TNG should it get funded" then it might have stopped the outrage, because it wasn't a promise, only an incentive.

As it stood, there was no reason to really donate past the kickstarter goal (which has happened again with Terminator 2) so once more people donated, some people started slowly cutting back their pledges to even things out. I have no problem with people cutting back, because there really is no need to give an extra $40 just to get it funded when you could put that $40 into the next table: Farsight doesn't lose any money from this and the player gets what they want, everybody's happy.