As I’ve mentioned before I’m not one to tell you who to give your backer money to, but every now and then a project comes along that’s worth a closer look, and 12 is Better Than 6 is definitely one of those projects. The game has been on Kickstarter for a few days now in an attempt to raise £15,000 before October 9th, and it’s not going as well as It should given the quality of the demo.
12 is Better Than 6 is a Hotline Miami inspired black & white top-down western shooter that has a serious Tarantino vibe to it. Best thing ever, or insufferable nonsense? Depends on how you feel about the games’ mix of elements.
For my part 12 is Better Than 6 wasn’t at all what I was expecting. When I loaded up the demo I figured I’d be racing through hand-drawn levels mowing enemies down ala Alien Shooter; boy was I wrong. While twitchy gamers may be able to race through 12 is Better Than 6, I found myself having to work through things from a more tactical standpoint. A dearth of ammo, the one shot kills, and the need to chamber rounds before firing means that combat in the game isn’t something you simply rush through, it needs to be planned. Once you get into a firefight though things are terrifying, bloody, and completely satisfying.
My only issue with 12 is Better Than 6 concerns the dialogue. I wouldn’t say I was offended by it, but it is certainly pretty crude. I’m no prude when it comes to cussing or slurs being used in my entertainment, the crudeness of a Tarantino script has a certain poetry and energy to it after all, but the the lines in 12 is Better Than 6 feel flat and took me out of the experience. Although I have my concerns regarding the dialog, I’m still backing 12 is Better Than 6 because I figure any game with a demo that I play through a dozen times in a row is worth some support.
So, if 12 is Better Than 6 is so amazing then why is its Kickstarter campaign off to such a sluggish start? I think it comes down to a couple things, and they’re not the usual culprits. The first is that while the Kickstarter video is chock full of gameplay footage, the campaign page itself shows very little. There’s a lovely animated gif, but that’s it; no screenshots, only two pieces of artwork, and nothing showing off the sort of environments we can expect from the game. The other problem concerns the reward tiers; there’s 22 of them, which is way too many for backers to look through. The other problem with the reward tiers is that the developers are undervaluing their work. As a backer like that 14 of the tiers are less than $100 and that I can get the game for as little as $3.06, but that can’t be good from a funding standpoint. As of this writing there are 201 backers donating a total $2,679, that’s an average of only $13.32 per backer. Nearly all of the backers, 169 of them to be exact, are in at the $3.06 tier to get a copy of the game. Unfortunately there isn’t much compelling people to go higher. The next tier than offers anything worthwhile (i.e., something other than a copy of the game and the awesome soundtrack) is $34 to get into the Alpha. Unfortunately that’s 8 tiers further down, which is a lot of hunting. In my opinion if the developers had slashed their tiers down to 12 – 15 and put the early bird tier with a copy of the game at $10.00 they’d be doing much better.
Armchair quarterbacking aside, 12 is Better Than 6 is promising game that’s worth a look. Check out the trailer, download the demo, and decide for yourself. Hell, backing for $3.06 in exchange for a copy of the game down the line means you’re not exactly breaking the bank; I just hope the campaign does well enough for the developers to collect.
Track the progress of the 12 is Better Than 6 Kickstarter in our Campaign Calendar.
