The Apocalypse Now Kickstarter is gone but not forgotten – they’re still looking for crowdfunding, just without the oversight.
I’m going to be honest for a moment: I thought the Apocalypse Now Kickstarter looked kind of terrible. James felt it was basically superfluous when we already have Spec Ops: The Line. And as it turns out, you lot – the general public – seemed inclined to agree with us, as the project slipped into a swampy river.
It only raised $172,000 US of it’s $900,000 goal within three weeks and, seeing that it wasn’t going to make its total, the Apocalypse Now Kickstarter has been cancelled by its creators, Erebus LLC. Literally, it was cancelled just now:
What does this mean? Well, anyone who had pledged towards the project will not be charged, of course, but that doesn’t mean this sorry endeavour is over and done with.
They’ve set up their own crowdfunding platform, over on apocalypsenow.com/pledge. Perhaps realising the errors in their original campaign, Erebus LLC have also changed the parameters of the funding mission. Specifically, they’ve extended the deadline to 458 days, and increased the funding ask to a whopping $5.9 million dollars.
By way of a reward for people who stick with the project, any existing backers who follow the Apocalypse Now Kickstarter to their private platform will be rewarded with one pledge level increase for free. You might want to think carefully before you do, though.
Kickstarter is a large and very public endeavour with some degree of oversight, but I’m sure we can all count half a dozen occasions that backers have been burned without even giving it too much thought. To move away from the official Kickstarter platform introduces an additional degree of risk that a discerning punter shouldn’t be OK with. It’s like the warnings Ebay gives you about not offering to make sales outside of the platform. Yes, on the one hand they’re trying to prevent you cutting them out of the deal, but they do offer a degree of protection for both parties.
At the time of writing, $66,000 dollars has been pledged by just under 300 people, on the new platform following the Apocalypse Now Kickstarter cancellation. All we’re saying is be careful, folks.
