Kickstarter’s Top 50: How Good Are They?
by Marcus Estrada
[dropcap]D[/dropcap]espite being around for many years, it wasn’t until a few massive projects landed on the site that most video game players earnestly began to back projects. It’s fitting that the project that started this wave, Double Fine Adventure, remains the most funded of all video games thus far. What does it really mean to be one of the most funded games on Kickstarter? Does this ensure a successful final product? Nope, but it does show the impressive power of a strong marketing machine.In an attempt to make a little sense of funding and its possible relation to eventual game quality we’ve gathered some information. First, we grabbed the names of the top 50 funded video game projects on Kickstarter that have been released to date (excluding a handful of mobile or web-exclusive games for sake of score consistency), games that represent $27.54 million in Kickstarter crowdfunding. Next, we took to Steam to see how gamers themselves felt about the projects. On Steam, every game with a few reviews gets a percentage stating how many of user reviews are positive. This is possible thanks to every reviewer being required to assign a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” with their post. This rating “positivity” is what we are using to gauge how much players enjoy each title.
Why didn’t we use Metacritic when that is often the go-to metric for valuing games? It’s quite simple: Most Kickstarter games do not have a Metacritic rating. In order to receive one, a listed game requires a minimum of four submitted critic reviews. Being listed as a critic is no walk in the park either as it requires sites to pump out a minimum amount of reviews a month. With all that said, it appears not enough big name sites are currently reviewing a majority of crowdfunded releases, so we simply can’t use Metacritic as our score source.
Here are the Steam user positivity breakdown as of November 13, 2014:
As you can see, a single game has been so well-received that all Steam reviews grant it a hearty thumbs up. The title in question is Awesomenauts: Starstorm which is an expansion to Awesomenauts. By looking at the numbers you can also see that many titles are clustered within the upper echelon of high scores (99% down to 80%). Of course, every game isn’t included in their company. As the percentage of positivity decreases there are still games backing up nearly each spot. Thankfully nothing is in the positively broken category of 1-19%!
Just looking at a chart of numbers isn’t the most effective way for everyone to understand data. To help with visualization needs, here’s a scatter chart that shows all 50 top funded games and where their positivity falls from 0% to 100%:
With this chart you can really see just how varied player reaction is for these momentous Kickstarter games. For the most part, they stick within a pretty positive space, but a few outliers are deemed stinkers by the majority of gamers. This bodes well for Kickstarter because it helps to debunk the notion that “every” Kickstarter release is flawed or broken which some folks believe to be the case. However, the data also proves that not every hyped and super funded project will turn out amazingly. Hype does not make a game good – it simply inflates expectations – perhaps unfairly so.
Social media hype is a powerful driver of Kickstarter success. In fact, it may be the most important asset for a campaign to have. When word got out about Double Fine Adventure, the press went wild, but so too did gamers themselves. They knew for a fact that Double Fine and Tim Schafer are both awesome! As such, the project flew past its goal before even really offering heavy details about the game which would eventually become Broken Age. Many games on this top 50 funded list are on it thanks to well known developers or teams – but not all of them.
If pie charts are more your thing, here’s another look at the data:
This is a bit more subjective in that this chart attaches value judgments (great, good, average, bad) to percentages. With that said, they were designed in a way that hopefully aligns with most gamer perceptions of what they enjoy or don’t enjoy playing. If all you ever want to play is subjectively “great” and “good” titles, then Kickstarter works well. By this chart, of the 50 titles, 88% (or 43 games) might be worth you time! This is pretty impressive, although it probably stretches the notion of “good” to many gamers out there. If we remove the 60-69% then it’s just a bit lower at 41 titles.
None of this avoids the fact that some games just do not turn out how they were planned. Backers of those projects have every right to be disappointed with the final product. It stinks to purchase a bleh game! If you’re reading this, then you probably want all the details. Which of the 50 most funded titles performed the best and which are the absolute worst according to players? We certainly don’t intend to leave you in the dark.
Here is a complete list of the 50 games as listed from most funded (top) to least (bottom) so you can see for yourself:
As shown, the top performers as far as gamers are concerned are (aside from Awesomenauts) are: Shovel Knight, FTL, Tex Murphy Tesla Effect, The Long Dark, and Guns of Icarus. The very lowest performers are: Starlight Inception, Takedown: Red Sabre, Godus, Jagged Alliance Flashback, and Akaneiro: Demon Hunters. Surprised by some of these? We sure are!
Part of the equation makes sense. Of course projects with massive fan followings would be heavily funded (see: Tex Murphy, Jagged Alliance Flashback). However, it’s shocking just how poorly some games from established, well known developers and franchises are received. Why is this? Well, that’s a whole other topic. This is just the start of posts exploring crowdfunding data here on Cliqist. Be on the look out for more soon and let us know in the comments if there’s a specific topic or question that you’d love to see covered!
[divider]For the second part of this piece we present you with a slightly more visual breakdown of each game, how much it raised on Kickstarter, and its user rating on Steam. You’ll also find some links to buy some of the games if you like, as well as links to our coverage of said titles.
Broken Age – $3,336,371 – 93% Positive
Broken Age – Wasteland 2 – $2,933,371 – 86% Positive
Wasteland 2 – Planetary Annihilation – $2,229,344 – 74% Positive
Planetary Annihilation – Available on: Steam
Shadowrun Returns – $1,836,447 – 90% Positive
Shadowrun Returns – Dreamfall Chapters – $1,538,425 – 87% Positive
Dreamfall Chapters – Massive Chalice – $1,229,015 – 81% Positive
Massive Chalice – Available on: Steam
Godus – £526,563 – 40% Positive
Godus – Available on: Steam
Divinity Original Sin – $944,282 – 93% Positive
Divinity Original Sin – Broken Sword 5: The Serpent’s Curse – $771,560 – 89% Positive
Broken Sword 5: The Serpent’s Curse – The Banner Saga – $723,886 – 91% Positive
The Banner Saga – Castle Story – $702,516 – 50% Positive
Castle Story – Available on: Steam
Leisure Suit Larry Reloaded – $655,182 – 76% Positive
Leisure Suit Larry Reloaded – Tex Murphy Tesla Effect – $598,104 – 95% Positive
Tex Murphy Tesla Effect – Grim Dawn – $537,515 – 93% Positive
Grim Dawn – Available on: Steam
7 Days To Die – $507,612 – 84% Positive
Available on: Steam
Carmageddon Reincarnation – $625,143 – 93% Positive
Carmageddon Reincarnation – Available on: Steam
Mobeius: Empire Rising – $435,316 – 76% Positive
Mobeius: Empire Rising – Solforge – $429,715 – 80% Positive
Solforge – Available on: Steam
Smallworld 2 – $394,019 – 81% Positive
Available on: Steam
Jagged Alliance Flashback – $368,614 – 41% Positive
Jagged Alliance Flashback – Available on: Steam
Awesomenauts Starstorm – $345,835 – 100% Positive
Awesomenauts Starstorm – Available on: Steam
Dead State – $332,635 – 81% Positive
Dead State – Available on: Steam
Shovel Knight – $311,502 – 98% Positive
Shovel Knight – TUG – $293,184 – 71% Positive
TUG – Available on: Steam
Defense Grid 2 – $271,726 – 84% Positive
Defense Grid 2 – Available on: Steam
Battle Worlds Kronos – $260,235 – 78% Positive
Battle Worlds Kronos – Among The Sleep – $248,358 – 84% Positive
Among The Sleep – The Long Dark – $256,217 – 95% Positive
Available on: Steam
Pier Solar and the Great Architects – $237,370 – 79% Positive
Maia – £140,481 – 53% Positive
Maia –Available on: Steam
Takedown: Red Sabre – $221,833 – 38% Positive
Takedown: Red Sabre – Available on: Steam
Akaneiro: Demon Hunters – $204,680 – 48% Positive
Akaneiro: Demon Hunters – Available on: Steam
FTL – $200,542 – 97% Positive
Guns of Icarus – $198,741 – 95% Positive
Guns of Icarus – Available on: Steam
Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams – $186,158 – 83% Positive
Strike Suit Zero – $174,804 – 82% Positive
Strike Suit Zero – Road Redemption – $173,803 – 89% Positive
Road Redemption – Available on: Steam
Sunless Sea – £100,803 – 88% Positive
Sunless Sea – Available on: Steam
Nekro – $158,733 – 84% Positive
Nekro – Available on: Steam
Starlight Inception – $158,152 – 22% Positive
Starlight Inception – Available on: Steam
The Dead Linger – $154,968 – 67% Positive
The Dead Linger – Available on: Steam
Xenonauts – $154,715 – 92% Positive
Xenonauts – Son of Nor – $151,175 – 76% Positive
Son of Nor – Available on: Steam
Sir, You Are Being Hunted – £92,551 – 88% Positive
Sir, You Are Being Hunted – Planet Explorers – $137,765 – 82% Positive
Planet Explorers – Available on: Steam
Shadowgate – $137,232 – 95% Positive
Shadowgate – Mercenary Kings – $116,064 – 82% Positive
Mercenary Kings – Available on: Steam
The Stomping Land – $114,060 – 64% Positive
The Stomping Land – Available on: Steam
Neverending Nightmares – $106,722 – 79% Positive
Neverending Nightmares – AR-K – $101,564 – 71% Positive
AR-K – Available on: Steam
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*The GOG links above are affiliate links, meaning Cliqist gets a small portion of each sale. If you’d like to check any of them out on GOGs website but prefer to not support Cliqist you can get to GOG at this link, affiliate free.
[author image=”http://cliqist.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/marcus.jpg” ] Marcus is a fellow with a love for video games, horror, and Japanese food. When he’s not writing about games for a multitude of sites, he’s usually still playing one. One day when he became fed up with the way sites would ignore niche titles he decided to start his own site by the name of Pixel Pacas. Writing about video games is something he hopes to continue doing for many years to come. Some of Marcus’s favorite games include Silent Hill 2, Killer7, and The Sims. [/author]
