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I've thought about getting into the Kickstarter thing, but I don't know how likely people would be to pay me to draw bad cartoons about times I was embarrassed. Oh, well…at least I still have Blogger.
News Blips:
Developer Double Fine is breaking Kickstarter records with its crowdfunding venture. So far, fans have chipped in over a million dollars to finance the point-and-click-adventure game/documentary. The original fundraising goal was $400,000, and it hit that mark in a little over eight hours. Kickstarter has confirmed that "Double Fine Adventure" has made more money in 24 hours and has more backers than any project in the site's history. What can we take away from this? For starters, if you're going to ask strangers to fund a game, sight unseen, it helps to be the people who made The Secret of Monkey Island.
Skylanders: Spyro's Adventure has done a fair bit of business. According to an Activision Blizzard investor letter released today, the for-reals-Pokémon title was the "#1 kids video game for 2011 with 20+ million toys sold." That's a lot of microchipped plastic critters, and I can't help but think that Bitmob writer Jasmine Rea had something to do with it. You should have seen her Twitter when that came out. It was like going up to madness and giving it a big hug.
Nordic Games has divulged the secret contents of Alan Wake's PC editions. If you haven't played Remedy Entertainment's 2010 "psychological action thriller" yet, first of all: shame on you. Second, you might be interested to know that the Standard Edition of the upcoming PC release will include both "The Signal" and "The Writer" expansion packs, a soundtrack, postcards, a poster, and stickers! For those who like their editions a little more collector-y, the Collector's Edition will include all of that (yes, even the stickers), as well as a bonus disc containing behind-the-scenes featurettes and the "Alan Wake Files" expanded fiction book. Both versions will have updated graphics and 3D support and will be available in stores on March 2. [Eurogamer]
Version 2.0 of developer Exploding Rabbit's fanservice-a-thon Super Mario Bros. Crossover launched this week. The update adds Luigi and Mega Man 7's Bass as playable characters, as well as a new power-up system and "skinnable graphics." This means that the game switches randomly between graphic styles of systems from throughout Mario history. If you want to see the new characters and features in action, or you've never heard of this game and aren't sure why you should be interested, check out the official trailer below.
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