Unwritten Passage Project Falters after Kickstarter Success

[Andy Chalk]

Unwritten Passage Project Falters after Kickstarter Success

[kickstarter=1599677835/unwritten-that-which-happened]​

The developer of Unwritten Passage says personal problems and an inadequate budget have left the project stuck in limbo.

Unwritten Passage, which hit Kickstarter as Unwritten: That Which Happened, sounded awfully good, promising a life-or-death tale of a nomadic tribe trekking across a randomly-generated tundra to meet their god. But after successfully reaching its $75,000 goal in February 2013, development slowed to a crawl, and in a message posted on January 4, Roxlou Games founder Joe Houston acknowledged that the project is in trouble.

"Every person in life has a limited amount of themselves to give. I have been striking a compromise between a project that has had its own troubles, a family in crisis (that I oftentimes couldn't or wouldn't recognize), and the regular demands of supporting my wife and daughter on my own. I am tenacious and hardworking, and I have been creative in addressing the problems that I see," he wrote. "But I have my limits, and sometimes tenacity can become willful blindness and stubbornness. And those qualities don't honor the trust that my wife, my daughter, my backers, and my contributors put in me."

Houston said Unwritten Passage was intended to be finished in six months, but it's now around the 10-month mark with no end in sight. He's taken contract jobs on the side to try to keep things going, but it hasn't been enough. Explaining the budgetary shortfall would take "three full postmortems," he said, "one as an indie game developer, one as a small business owner, and one as a bit of flotsam swirling in the maelstrom of the U.S. health system," but the short version is that "two idioms apply: 'hindsight is 20/20,' and 'shit happens'."

As for the future of the game, Houston said he's not ready to throw in the towel, but "to say that the project as I pitched it is alive and well would be beyond naive. It would be dishonest." He wants to continue it as a side project as time and circumstance allow but added that for many backers, "this is probably the end." In a Kickstarter update [http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1599677835/unwritten-that-which-happened/posts/712501] posted today, however, he clarified that Unwritten Passage is "still ongoing (if on life-support)"; because of that, existing game assets won't be released into the public domain, although backers who want a refund may contact him to arrange it.

Source: Roxlou Games [http://www.roxlougames.com/reflections-and-confessions-for-a-new-year/]


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[Ishigami]

Oh don't worry afaik your not the first and you certainly won't be the last that won't deliver his KS.
I'm just waiting for the day one of the projects with a million budget bites the dust.
It will happen, just a matter of time.

 

[Eri]

Why do people that clearly don't have enough time to devote to a project decide to start up a project? These idiots keep doing this. It's not even necessarily a money issue all the time, but these people "run out" of time. Stop saying you're going to do something if you know you don't have the time to do it.

 

[Arkhangelsk]

Why do people that clearly don't have enough time to devote to a project decide to start up a project? These idiots keep doing this. It's not even necessarily a money issue all the time, but these people "run out" of time. Stop saying you're going to do something if you know you don't have the time to do it.

You can't always predict the future. Complications happen, and they're even worse when they're close to home, which seems to be his case. From what I can gather the stall is caused by medical bills that suddenly appear, wrongly calculating the time he'd need to spend on the project causing him to neglect other aspects of his life that require his attention. At least he's man enough to face the music and apologize for all of this. Give him a break, he's only human.

 

[SinisterGehe]

Why do people that clearly don't have enough time to devote to a project decide to start up a project? These idiots keep doing this. It's not even necessarily a money issue all the time, but these people "run out" of time. Stop saying you're going to do something if you know you don't have the time to do it.

So if you start a project get hit by a car and get paralyzed neck down. Or your child gets really sick for long time and requires expensive treatment. You are an idiot for not being able to allocate enough time and resource to Finish the product in time? Your logic fails there.
It clearly stated about medical bills and family crisis. We don't know what happened but I think he didn't see it coming.
At least he had the balls to come out with it instead of just fading away and get branded as a fraud.

Didn't back the project but sad for things to go down like this. Hopefully we get to see the it finished someday.

 

[Reaper195]

Oh don't worry afaik your not the first and you certainly won't be the last that won't deliver his KS.
I'm just waiting for the day one of the projects with a million budget bites the dust.
It will happen, just a matter of time.

I'm kind of expecting that to happen with Star Citizen. They keep adding more and more shit to that game, and I don't want it to be like Minecraft or DayZ where it's in beta (Alpha, for DayZ) for so long that by the time the
finished' product is out, I've long gotten over it.

 

[Amir Kondori]

Oh don't worry afaik your not the first and you certainly won't be the last that won't deliver his KS.
I'm just waiting for the day one of the projects with a million budget bites the dust.
It will happen, just a matter of time.

I'm kind of expecting that to happen with Star Citizen. They keep adding more and more shit to that game, and I don't want it to be like Minecraft or DayZ where it's in beta (Alpha, for DayZ) for so long that by the time the
finished' product is out, I've long gotten over it.

Minecraft's "Beta" was a finished product. I still play Minecraft here and there but most of my play time was on "beta" versions that nonetheless were feature complete.

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

Oh don't worry afaik your not the first and you certainly won't be the last that won't deliver his KS.
I'm just waiting for the day one of the projects with a million budget bites the dust.
It will happen, just a matter of time.

I'm kind of expecting that to happen with Star Citizen. They keep adding more and more shit to that game, and I don't want it to be like Minecraft or DayZ where it's in beta (Alpha, for DayZ) for so long that by the time the
finished' product is out, I've long gotten over it.

Hrm, beta for a year or so to release a finished product or rush it out and hope it works large scale? I choose beta for a year or so because I want a good game not "release nao because I have no patience!!!"
Seriously the instant gratification mindset is so childish and petty, and finishing a product with polish is so much smarter and a benefit to fans rather than smacking them in the face by releasing an unfinished piece of shit.

 

[Sarge034]

What's this? More proof that kickstarter is a really bad idea? Oh well I guess. My question is, "How the hell is this guy gonna pay back the backers if he doesn't have enough money to continue the project?"

 

[Altorin]

kickstarted 75,000? why?

what is the point of kickstarting 75,000? That's not even really enough to pay 2 programmers for a year. How did they assume to make a game with 75,000 dollars?

I mean, sure, kickstarter is usually only a part of the crowdfunding, but that just seems silly.

 

[Dragonlayer]

I wonder how many backers will calmly read the numerous problems this person (apparently) had and respond with an elequont and heart-felt "YOU FUCKING SCAMMER!".

As for myself, this is the first time I've ever heard of this game but not the first time I've read about a Kickstarter falling flat on its face, pointedly after obtaining a substantial amount of monetary backing, so ultimately I'm feeling a combination of not-fussed and voyeuristic glee at the troubles that will probably arise out of this.

 

[Quellist]

Cut the guy some slack, he's offered refunds to those who want them. Hopefully something will come along to get the project moving again, but the guy is clearly trying his best and doesn't deserve to be shit on for trying and failing

 

[Kahani]

Oh don't worry afaik your not the first and you certainly won't be the last that won't deliver his KS.
I'm just waiting for the day one of the projects with a million budget bites the dust.
It will happen, just a matter of time.

This one [http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/599092525/the-order-of-the-stick-reprint-drive] came pretty close. Almost two years and still now even close to finishing all the rewards. But it just proves the point others have made that it's pointless complaining that people can't predict the future. In that case, the artist sliced his hand open and came close to permanently crippling himself. Fortunately he's nearly recovered and will eventually be able to finish everything, but could you really blame him for not fulfilling all his promises if things had turned out slightly different?

kickstarted 75,000? why?

what is the point of kickstarting 75,000? That's not even really enough to pay 2 programmers for a year. How did they assume to make a game with 75,000 dollars?

Perhaps try reading the article? If he was trying to pay two programmers for a year, it would indeed be silly. But since that's not what they were trying to do, that's completely irrelevant. Paying one programmer and a couple of artists for half a year after they've already done quite a bit of work using their own money, and who continue to do other work to pay the bills, is an entirely different matter. They asked for the money they thought they'd need to finish the game, not the money you think they'd need to do something completely different.