Anatomy of a Kickstarter Failure

A few months ago I tried something new for this venture, a Kickstarter. I’ve never do one before and I set a goal of $800 in 21 days. This is more modest compared to some other kickstarters out there. The one I was working on was primarily focused on a new module for Beast Slayer, Lair of the Minotaur with a physical and digital edition. Plus some bonus content.

I had hoped to make $160 dollars by end of day one, but by then end of the whole campaign I had made $195 with 10 backers. Which, thank you to those that did back the project and believe in it. The reason behind the $160 day one goal was to get on trending page because it would have been 20% of goal.

Part of the difficulty is that I need to work on building the audience more for Beast Slayer. The community is admittedly on the smaller side at the moment, but those of you who are part of the community are so freaking awesome. I love getting to run the game for you and getting to play your own modules too.

However, a larger audience would have made funding this kickstarter easier. The lesson here being, work on building your audience for your game before launching your kickstarter.

Learning the layout of a kickstarter was fairly easy actually. The backend of it is well designed and easy to navigate. I did look up a few tutorials on how to do a few things on the platform but honestly, it wasn’t hard.

Now the question becomes, would I do it again? I think the answer is, yes. But, I don’t think I’ll be doing it anytime within the next few months. I’m going to try and continue working on building the audience and getting more demos out there in more game stores.

Even though the project failed, I’m proud I tried. This is not the end. I will learn, and adapt. There is so much more about this business I have yet to learn, even doing it part time.

This is part of the challenge of going the indie route, and doing it solo. It can be rewarding, but there are still mountains to climb. Hopefully, we can continue building this community together. It will take time. it will be a challenge. But with dedication, we will get there.