Though its developer won’t say when, Star Command should be finished soon.
Kickstarter is the world’s premier site for crowdsourcing. That said, many are uncomfortable with the lack of accountability fundraising campaigns have to their contributors. While there are success stories originating from Kickstarter, there are also cases of failure that have cost people money and left them with nothing to show for it. Warballoon’s Star Command could easily look like such a fiasco. The benefactor of two successful Kickstarter campaigns, Star Command has, nonetheless, been delayed multiple times since the end of its first fundraiser in 2011. According to Jordan Coombs, co-founder of the game’s developer Warballoon, however, it may finally be nearing the finish line.
“The game is 99, maybe 98 percent complete,” said Coombs, speaking to Polygon. “It’s really close.” As definite as that sounds, Coombs himself is reluctant to put out any new release dates, on the off chance the game needs to be pushed back again. “No release date until it’s final,” said Coombs. “We have made too many people angry issuing release dates.” Coombs’s caution may be prudent. Originally slated for a December 2011 release, Star Command is now nearly fifteen months past its original deadline. “We expected a six month process because that’s what it takes to make a mobile game,” said Coombs. “But we’re making a PC game, for all intents and purposes, this isn’t Angry Birds or Fruit Ninja as far as complexity”
Complexity aside, Star Command has endured several setbacks during its development. In April 2012, WarBalloon revealed that, out of the $37,000 the studio had raised from its Kickstarter campaign, only $4000 had been spent on development of the game itself. Warballoon eventually launched a second Kickstarter campaign to help finance PC and Mac versions of Star Command, a move that drew criticism from some of its backers, disgruntled over the lack of progress on the versions already in the works. Despite this, the second campaign raised an additional $151,000 and, since then, the game’s development has chugged along to its current near-end point. With the conclusion of its orderal now on the horizon, one can only imagine the relief both Warballoon and the thousands of people who funded Star Command must be feeling.
Source: Polygon
