Interabang starts Fig crowdfunding campaign for Jay and Silent Bob video game

Interabang Entertainment is launching a crowdfunding campaign on the Fig game-financing platform for a video game based on the Jay and Silent Bob cartoon series.

The Fig Publishing platform lets fans invest their own money into a crowdfunding campaign thanks to changes in securities laws enabled by Regulation A+ of the JOBS Act, which allows ordinary consumers to fund projects in exchange for ownership in a company. It is a creative alternative for developers who want to be independent or can’t raise money from traditional sources such as venture capitalists or game publishers.

The companies hope to raise $400,000 in the campaign. Interabang is an indie game studio that previously worked on Super Comboman for Adult Swim Games. Now it is creating Jay and Silent Bob: Chronic Blunt Punch. The team includes fans of Kevin Smith’s Askewniverse, a fictional world used in Smith’s films such as Clerks. Interabang hopes to capture the satire and irreverence of the movies.

In this zany game, you’ll be able to jump into the shoes of Lunchbox and Mr. Snoogans. Players can get into a tag-team combo fight fest and “wreak havoc on their foes with fists, feet, and the magic of self-esteem-destroying jibes while embarking on a mission to find their long-lost pot customers trapped in a Orwellian mega super shopping mall.” The mall turns out to be a Utopian labyrinth with apartments, restaurants, hospitals, and everything that a post-World War II nuclear bunker would contain.

Above: Jay and Silent Bob are getting their own video game.

Image Credit: Fig

The title is a colorful side-scrolling, 2.5D, over-the-top multiplayer tag-team brawler. The action escalates as the player travels deeper into the mall of purgatory. The developers are creating the narrative through environment, design, combat, and a new conversation-combat system called the Convo Combo mode. This mechanic changes the dynamics of enemy showdowns through “yo mama” insults combined with an facial animation system that bonds dynamic fighting with timed phrase matching. The team hopes this will deliver a completely different kind of storytelling experience. Jay and Silent Bob: Chronic Blunt Punch will also include co-op play, where players finish each other’s combos.

“Kevin Smith’s films have long inspired our team,” said Interabang founder Justin Woodward in a statement. “During development for our first game, we’d take breaks to watch them back to back. The iconic characters, hilarious dialogue, and sheer surrealism of the Askewniverse got us through rough patches during development and life’s struggles. We kept coming back to thinking about how amazing it would be to see Jay and Silent Bob in a game like the ones we design, and we’re amazed that we have this opportunity now.”

“People have asked me for years why I never made a Jay and Silent Bob video game,” said Smith in a statement. “Now I can tell them I was waiting for Justin Woodward from Interabang Entertainment and our own Elias to bring it together. Couldn’t be happier to hand our characters off to folks who know them as well as I do.”

Investments in the game shares will start at $250. Before Fig Publishing can collect on reservations, the Regulation A offering must be qualified by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Investors can get a range of rewards, such as premium digital goods and new action figures, as well as a walk-on role in Kevin Smith’s next movie.

“The first time I heard about Justin creating a game based on Jay and Silent Bob, I wanted it to be a Fig campaign,” said Justin Bailey, the CEO of Fig, in a statement. “I mean, Kevin Smith and Jason Mewes in a Castle Crasher style brawler, fighting with fists, feet, and insults — what’s not to like?! This campaign will provide traditional rewards and accept accredited investment as well as unaccredited reservations, which will be collected once they are re-confirmed after the SEC filing process is complete.”

Above: Interabang Entertainment is raising money for its Jay and Silent Bob video game via FIG.

Image Credit: FIG