Would you fund our indie game with shares on BTC-TC?

[lritter]

Hi everyone,

I'm writing here after contacting Ethan Burnside, the administrator of the Bitcoin Trading Corp, who liked our idea and suggested we'd discuss it with the community. I initially posted this in the Newbies section, but after being cleared to post everywhere, I'll put it here, where I think this post belongs. I hope nobody's mad that it's technically a re-post now ;-)

We are a two-headed (and married) team of indie developers from Dresden, Germany, currently working on our first title, NOWHERE, an ambitious open world game which is due to be released in 2015. One year ago we funded a company to be able to sell preorders, Mojang-style. So far we have sold about 158 preorders to old and new fans and friends of our previous projects. Alphafunders receive access to new alpha versions as they happen. (More details are listed in the FAQ on the site.)

Now, the idea is to fund our production full-time (as it is currently still being cross-financed by my day job) by distributing securities through BTC-TC, offering asset holders a major share of our first productions revenue as it manifests; we plan to bring the game to perfection and release it through Steam in order to maximize our revenue.

Therefore I would love to gauge interest in this forum for this idea and respond to your questions, should you have any.

Here are a few additional background resources:

• A blog post covering more details about how the game came about
• http://www.leonard-ritter.com/, my profile site
• http://www.sylvia-ritter.com/, the art website of Sylvia
• http://www.paniq.cc/, a previous electronic music project of mine that some of you might already know

Thank you for your time,

Leonard & Sylvia Ritter
Duangle GbR

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[lophie]

Hey, I hope it works for your guys but I have to ask, Isn't this more like a kickstarter thing :S?

Why don't you just accept pre-orders via Bitcoin directly?

[dilatedPixel]

Sounds interesting...

Are you funding a company that's making a game or just ownership in this one project?

How are you valuing the company/project?

Are you willing to set progress goals and relinquish control of all the project's assets if you fail to meet those goals on time? Otherwise there is the carrot (completed project you have equity in) but no stick to pressure the project to timely completion...

[lritter]

Hey, I hope it works for your guys but I have to ask, Isn't this more like a kickstarter thing :S?

Yes it is, but we're not located in the US or the UK, so we're not able to collect Kickstarter funds. You need to have an English/American banking account to do KS. Besides, we would rather like to try something new.

Why don't you just accept pre-orders via Bitcoin directly?

We do, actually. It's all on the page.

Are you funding a company that's making a game or just ownership in this one project?

Just for the project and all sequels.

How are you valuing the company/project?

The project is estimated to derive most of its value from profit dividends paid out from sales of alpha/beta access and copies of final versions. As we are in development for two more years, there's going to be a very low dividend for the first 1.5 years, and the biggest spike of profit influx around the release date, followed by a steep fall-off; therefore we estimate that before release the share has potential to gain speculative value, but after release and early post-release dividends, the share will most likely lose value continuously. Nothing lasts forever, but unlike other operations, the death of this one is timed.

However, if the combined all-time profit exceeds the value of the stock at issue date by 120% (we can debate this figure), we're going to do a sequel, and the shares regain new potential for additional dividends.

Are you willing to set progress goals and relinquish control of all the project's assets if you fail to meet those goals on time? Otherwise there is the carrot (completed project you have equity in) but no stick to pressure the project to timely completion...

Good point. We rejected an earlier offer to borrow funding for the simple reason that, should we be unable to pay back the loan, we would have to hand over the company and lose our IP; would we, however, only be able to pay back the loan plus interest, then nothing would be gained, and we would be right where we started. That risk was deemed too great to take. We're trying to build something here.

Therefore, by issuing shares and paying out dividends, we decided to share some of the risk with investors instead. I can see how a stick helps to build trust. We can set a hard release date, and e.g. release all project assets into the public domain should the date not be met. It's harder to commit exactly to milestones for the time in-between -- every shareholder receives access to an alpha account which would allow her/him to see first hand how her/his project is doing compared to the timetable of features we agreed upon beforehand.

[stslimited]

before you go too far down the wrong rabbit whole, you can start a kickstarter if you are not in the US or UK. Get a lawyer to set up a limited liability company in a united state (*cough* WYOMING *cough*), get a registered agent in that desired state to set up the bank account, a virtual office and also have him set up Amazon Payments. Amazon Payments will require a utility bill at your virtual office address to prove that you live there, this is Amazon's interpretation of a newer IRS regulatory requirement, but it is by no means anything that has to be truthful because it is not law, only Amazon's way of trying to comply.

You wire funds to the bank account to fund it.

Artificial persons (Corporations, LLCs) are recognized as legitimate people in the United States and you will have access to all now, as the bank account will be used to access your paypal and amazon payments and whatever you want now online.

This should not cost you more than $600 dollars.

So now you can create a kickstarter.

[Surprise]

I would potentially be interested in funding this, but as an investor I'd want to know what marketing plan you have for release before buying shares.

[ausbitbank]

I'd be keen to see the full details - the game concept sounds interesting and I'm always on the hunt for the next IPO

[ThickAsThieves]

I'd be keen to see the full details - the game concept sounds interesting and I'm always on the hunt for the next IPO

I'm a little confused about what you actually do in the game. Float around?

[ffssixtynine]

To add a little flavour to the conversation...

Investing in a game is very different from joining a kickstarter. Make sure you know the difference. Very, very few games even make their costs back and many games never even get finished. If you're investing, there is a hell of a lot you would want to know.

One of my jobs is a games consultant. Please be careful with your money.

To the developers, remember that bitcoin is taxable. In Germany I think it's covered by your barter laws. You may need to look out for tax based on euro value upon receipt, the more tax based on any profit you make afterwards purely in the coins. You must must must have a professional accountant plan this with you.

All that said, good luck! If anyone wants to know more about the industry before investing, and it would be an interesting investment, drop me a line.

Really good luck to the developers if you go through with this.

[lritter]

I would potentially be interested in funding this, but as an investor I'd want to know what marketing plan you have for release before buying shares.

Thanks for asking! The marketing plan for releasing indie games depends on the funds available and mostly circulates about building early excitement; the cheapest, most effective strategies are to keep sending material to game review blogs such as Rock Paper Shotgun, submit the game for an IGF award (these are often awarded before the game is even out yet), maintain development articles and videos, make alpha pre-orders available to involve the community in early word of mouth and testing, basically do anything to get noticed that isn't directly perceived as advertisement and costs us as little as possible. (Advertisement that is perceived as such, such as banner ads and ad clips generates negative momentum)

Final reviews will all be synchronized around the day of release to maximize the impact. We'll have two primary outlets, which is our own site, where the game is associated with a personal account, and Steam, because there's just no way around it.

I'd be keen to see the full details - the game concept sounds interesting and I'm always on the hunt for the next IPO

Thanks! That's why we're doing this post, to figure out what future shareholders might be interested in / concerned with. We have a half-done business plan floating around, which we'll fully spec out, should the initial feedback turn out to be generally positive.

I'm a little confused about what you actually do in the game. Float around?

Yep. You just float around. That is the game.

Except there's this entire procedural open world to explore and change, a strong time travelling aspect and a complex AI system planned, too. A summary of the game is posted at the top of the project site, and a meandering blog article of mine provides more background.

[muyuu]

I think the shareholder model requires more legal involvement.

You should try these for more informal funding:

http://www.indiegogo.com/
https://bitcoinstarter.com/


As for the game itself, I find it kind of purposeless. Even in Minecraft you "build things". If you just wandered around and interacted with others without leaving any sort of footprint it would get old really soon. A game needs some sort of purpose to be playable over a reasonable time span. Otherwise it becomes a sort of interactive demo. These can be very cool, but it will be hard to get many people to pay for it.

Remember those fractal landscape navigation demos from the 90s? Even being something so novel back then, people wouldn't keep floating around for more than a few minutes. They wouldn't pay much for that.

[ffssixtynine]

To correct you a bit, a game doesn't need a clear purpose to sell good numbers these days. There is a market for games like Dear Esther.

That's not to say it doesn't ned considering.

Marketing efforts are best done via IGF and other indie awards/festivals, key online magazines, pre-sales to fans, blog updates, reddit, YouTube, perhaps twitch now, that sort of thing. It's a time thing more than a budget thing and it can be quite distracting to development, that's the main concern.

[muyuu]

To correct you a bit, a game doesn't need a clear purpose to sell good numbers these days. There is a market for games like Dear Esther.

That's not to say it doesn't ned considering.

Marketing efforts are best done via IGF and other indie awards/festivals, key online magazines, pre-sales to fans, blog updates, reddit, YouTube, perhaps twitch now, that sort of thing. It's a time thing more than a budget thing and it can be quite distracting to development, that's the main concern.

There is some purpose in Dear Esther. It's a game about discovery, not that different to games as far back as the 80s.

[ffssixtynine]

Discovery, exploration, experience, play - all are valid. I know many, many people who disagree about dear Esther having a purpose, or evenif it is a game.

Either way, I think this is a question for the devs in terms of their business strategy. The moment you have investors is the moment you have to justify creative decisions, or the investors have to trust you to make the right ones. As a creative, it's a tricky place to be!

Kickstarter isn't an investment so the load is lightened somewhat, but the same problem still exists. People have expectations.