Some thoughts on Bloodstained and Success

Consider that the Kickstarter was alive for a single month with no real advertising other than some YouTube videos. They only asked for a little, but got a lot. I'm sure IGA felt the same way you do, so that's perfectly fine. Is the game a sucess? If that's the real question we can't know yet just like you stated. We will get the game though, so I'll get what I paid for. Supporting IGA this way feels like a personal sucess to me. The game is not likely to be something that I don't like based on IGA's previous titles.

Now if the real question is will the game sell like hot cakes, we don't know. It's being released on a whole slew of platforms though. People will notice.

Here is the real challenge. It's up to you and I to support this game and share it with our friends. If you want it to be a sucess in sales it up to us. If you want a follow up game, we need to make this one a hit.

It's a fair question, rvmcypressgrave. We can't truly know if this game will be a success until it's actually released. Like Mike said, it's on us to buy copies and try to get our friends to buy copies too.

However, I think it's also fair to say that Bloodstained has a very good chance of being a financial success--i.e recouping at least 10 million dollars in terms of sales. IGA is well known, there are masses of gamers eager to thumb their noses at Konami, and some of Bloodstained's features, such as Miriam customization, seem very likely to generate a great deal of enthusiasm. All these factors lead me to believe it's reasonably likely the game will be a financial success. But it is on IGA and his team as well. I do hope we'll see some gameplay footage soon...

Profitability for Bloodstained is undoubted at this point. It was funded by fans and more people will certainly buy it. Is it profitable in the eyes of the publishers? That is the real question. I know during the panels there is an emphasis on the "we sure showed those publishers" theme and I understand that a lot of this is for show. Obviously you need to maintain enthusiasm as you can't go into one of those things without being really energetic and supportive of your own game. I take issue with that statement though because I am a huge fan of Iga and gaming in general and am genuinely worried about whether these games are sustainable in today's gaming economy or if kickstarter is the only place they can truly thrive.



Xombiemike said "Now if the real question is will the game sell like hot cakes, we don't know. It's being released on a whole slew of platforms though. People will notice.

Here is the real challenge. It's up to you and I to support this game and share it with our friends. If you want it to be a sucess in sales it up to us. If you want a follow up game, we need to make this one a hit."

As pessimistic as my post may sound I am 100% sure this game will sell well. I do worry though that if Iga tries to continue creating games that he would still not be able to convince a publisher to support him and if he does is it going to be sustainable in a world where a powerhouse like Kojima productions isn't seen as worth the risk?

I certainly try to convince people, as I always have, but I guess I am disheartened by the game choices my friends make. As much as I would rant about how awesome Castlevania is, the people I have spoken to and showed the games to always gravitate toward some trite jrpg or unimaginative shooter, and I end up on here or Castlevania dungeon essentially preaching to the choir. I certainly have dropped a lot of cash on this game and will probably end up getting it on every platform.

Crocodile said "What you can do is compare the backer numbers and dollars to other big Kickstarter games (Pillars of Eternity, Wasteland 2, Divinity: Original Sin, etc.) and see how they line up."
That is a good idea though I would have several questions (not sure you could answer, so I probably need to research) about the comparison. Firstly I need to know the genres for all of those games, then see the sales data. I think it would be really helpful to know if any of them found success with a subsequent game, if another was created (nonkickstarter). 

gunlord500 said " IGA is well known, there are masses of gamers eager to thumb their noses at Konami, and some of Bloodstained's features, such as Miriam customization, seem very likely to generate a great deal of enthusiasm. All these factors lead me to believe it's reasonably likely the game will be a financial success. But it is on IGA and his team as well. I do hope we'll see some gameplay footage soon..."
I agree that many people are angry at Konami but I don't think that would have much of an effect on sales tbh. I am personally upset as I love Castlevania (Classic, Iga, and Coxian), Contra, Metal Gear, and Vandal Hearts (II is my favorite game) but gamers aren't buying the games they are making and if they can be more profitable elsewhere then I understand. The blame falls on gamers in general who don't buy the games or use emulators instead of supporting the devs. I just don't want these franchises to dissappear or turn into ftp mobile games.
I also am looking forward to some gameplay footage.

Nyahahaha said "To say it won't be able to achieve such numbers would be rather unreasonable."
I completely agree with this iteration being profitable but I worry about the sustainability of Iga's games post kickstarter. 

"So, if it moves more than 450k units (500k actually, but we already have 60k preorders) worldwide at $40, I'd say that at least some of the publishers would be inclined to support these kinds of projects in the future.

Judging by the shown KS interest and current trends, the chances of achieving that seem rather likely."
I feel like that is likely too but what publishers in particular would you see as willing to support future endeavors that are not backed at least partially by kickstarter? As mentioned above by Crocodile a lot of these games find a sort of niche in "mid-tier" publishing so is that what we can expect and is that who Iga was shopping his game to in the first place? I was under the impression that he was going to the major publishers (I believe I heard those exact words) and I am not convinced that the kickstarter has proved sufficient demand to them. Knowing how braindead they are I feel like the best we can hope for is that they make the games, market it to us 64k+ fans and then charge us $300 for it. lol
As for the 450k units I feel it is likely to move them but from the sales data I've seen the only Igavania to do that was Symphony of the Night (perhaps there is better sales data and I am just looking in the wrong place). I just want the enthusiasm for Iga's games to go beyond the hype of a successful kickstarter. I need these games to be around until I go out in a blaze of glory when I am ~90.

rvmcypressgrave, we don't are experts in that, but surely publishers are, right? Now think about that. IGA said that the initial goal was to show the publisher that there was enough interest, now he did get more than 10x what he needed.

Looking at this shows a lot, shows that if he reached the initial goal it would be enough to risk and publish, since they could profit, now imagine how assured you can be with that amount of money that they got on the campaign. This line of reasoning could fail in another cases, but in this specific case where a lot of publishers didn't had accepted this project and then only one did after knowing and thinking about all this, surely won't will fail.

Just to be clear, when I was talking about "mid-tier" I was referring solely to the relative budget of the game in question. Any publisher is capable of funding games of any sort if they have the appropriate resources - the term wasn't meant to be descriptive of the publishers themselves.

We need to spread the demographic out a bit. I'm glad we have regular posting females on this board, because it gives me hope. We need to gain a younger audience too. The mid to late teens would be great. Heck, if the game isn't too mature or if there are censorship settings, I want to get my oldest daughter playing with me. Of course, after the wife and I are done with our initial play through.

I wouldn't be surprised if the demographic for this game wasn't as limited as we might think. My girlfriend and my little sisters like the games and as you said there are female posters here too. I know a lot of the older gamers prefer the classical castlevanias while younger ones like the metroidvania style so I think the genre has a lot of appeal to a younger audience that likes games that are a bit easier.
I guess we can't ever be sure exactly unless the systems start scanning our government embedded id chips to keep track of gaming stats. 

I can see the game being popular with women, since it has a strong, powerful female protagonist. I'm not sure about the younger audience, though. It depends on whether the game gets a T rating or an M if it has a lot of violence and stuff. I suppose it's more likely than not it'll get a T, given the ratings of most IGAvanias...