3 Years After $700k Kickstarter, The Mandate Chugs Along Slowly

The funniest comment on the Kickstarter page of The Mandate, a sci-fi RPG that raised a whopping $700K via Kickstarter back in 2013, was written by a guy who posted a Youtube link to the Pocket God update song. For those unfamiliar with this hilarious clip—provided it’s used in the right context—the lyrics go something like, “Update, update, update, update, where is the update, give us the update.”

That being said, the comment was posted some weeks ago, on June 11^th, and since then developer Perihelion Interactive LLC has rectified that. In fact, they’ve posted two updates in quick succession, one being an open letter from the game’s producer, and the other announcing the hiring of a new community manager.

Perhaps then, it would be more apropos if the lyrics to the Pocket God song went a little more like this, “Game, game, game, game, where is the game, give us the game.” The front page of the Mandate’s Kickstarter, which still hasn’t been updated, promised—well, promises—a March 2015 or earlier delivery of backer rewards and the game itself. Obviously, that self-imposed deadline has long since passed, and that’s ticked off a great number of people that expected their stuff more than a year ago.

To be fair, Perihelion Interactive has been posting Kickstarter, Twitter, and Facebook updates every few months or so, but there are only so many progress updates that you can put out to placate the masses before they turn angry and start asking for their money back. As of right now, the community’s feelings are pretty mixed—some are sympathetic to the struggles of such an ambitious title, some are wielding pitchforks and asking for refunds, and others still are resigned to the fact that the game will either never come out or will come out long after it was supposed to come out. Take this comment for instance, from Charles Otto Daughtery III, “Alpha this year or refund… Ive [sic] had it,” and this much less angry one from Kai Barnard, “Perhaps but it got a larger studio involved, there is hope for some kind of beta at least next year….I have faith in this one.”

Nevertheless, the open letter from the Mandate’s producer, Michael, promises that the game is still alive and well and even addresses a certain “rough patch” over the course of the last year or so. Michael concedes that many “objectives and priorities” have changed during production, “code and art have been refactored,” and systems and designs have been “altered,” “updated and extended.”

After that, he follows up with something slightly more optimistic although still quite disconcerting, stating that they’ve finally put together the “ground work” and a “solid base” for the game. Actually, that’s really disconcerting, especially considering that he used the words “ground work” and “solid base,” and especially especially considering that the game’s release date was over a year ago! Let’s just hope that boils down to poor word choice.