New SWOS Game on Kickstarter

Do you know Kickstarter (www.kickstarter.com)?

Kickstarter is a funding site for artists. This includes artists from film, comic, music and also games. The site is created for everyone who has an idea, but not the money to start the project. If anybody thinks this Idea is good, he can spend money to you. The project is completely financed by the people that support the project and there is no company that tells you what this project has to be or how it has to make. Also the project is transparent. So you can see what the makers do in the progress. So it isn’t hidden behind the walls of a company. The project are from fans to fans.
As I am not so good to explain such things, let’s read what Kickstarter write.

Every project is independently crafted, put to all-or-nothing funding, and supported by friends, fans, and the public in return for rewards.

The filmmakers, musicians, artists, and designers you see on Kickstarter have complete control and responsibility over their own projects. They spend weeks building their own project pages, shooting their own videos, and brainstorming what to offer as rewards.

Every project creator sets their project s funding goal and deadline. If the project succeeds in reaching its funding goal all backers credit cards are charged when time expires. If the project falls short no one is charged.

People come to Kickstarter to build community around their projects. It s inspiring to be supported by people you know, and amazing to connect with strangers who are discovering your ideas for the first time.

There are more then 24 000 Project that was successful. So have a look on three examples.


Tim Schafer (creater and co-creater of Monkey Island Series and Day of the Tentacle) ask at Kickstarter for money support to create a new Adventure Game. With a succes. More then 3 000 000 Dollars was generated by fans to make a new Point and Click Adventure out of his hand.

Another example. Do you know Al Lowe, the creator of the Leisure Suit Larry series? As he haven t the money to make a new larry game, he starts a project at Kickstarter and generate 655 182 Dollars. Now they are going to make a remake of the 1st Larry game.

A 3rd example is Shadowrun. It was a good game on the Super Nintendo. The creaters of that game start a project at kickstarter and generate more then 1 000 000 Dollars to create a new Title with the look of the Super Nintendo Game.


Look on kickstartes. Even small teams with new fresh ideas generate more then 100 000 Dollars to create their ideas and that without the background of the 3 games I named in my examples.



So, what about to make an own Kickstarter project, to have a Remake of the SWOS Games for modern PCs? Sure it should be something like the Xbox 360 Version. New fresh look with old Gameplay and also with a good online mode (at least as good as the Kaillera Version).
To be true, this isn t possible to do it alone, as our community did not have any license to create a official SWOS game and maybe did not have the experience to create a game. Any Ideas how that could work out? I think you have to know the right people that allow you to start such a project and I think that would be Codemasters.
As I have completly no connection to them, what about some people on this community? As I know, one day Codemasters give us the right to name the Sensible Days the official SWOS World Cup. Who have made this connection to them?
On the other hand, when this is in any way possible you need someone you can trust in making this game independent without a big company in the back, that tells you what the game must have and what not. Who could be the person that have his own team (John Hare?)?


So this is very hypothetical at the moment. But it would be nice to talk about. What do you think about such an idea?

I have hopes in a complete java-remake of SWOS, with netplay included. That soccer-stages is great start, Redhair is onto sth..., Bomb does some work. So far, only little steps, but one day the blow has to come!

As I know, one day Codemasters give us the right to name the Sensible Days the official SWOS World Cup. Who have made this connection to them?

^^ that was me!

Non-existant user wrote:

Starting up a project involves close to none legal implications (no milestones to pursue, no obligations, nothing, everything s pretty much up in the air and false advertisement is so widespread it s not even funny), thus most of the projects starters just pocket most of the of the money as soon as they reach their quota and then fail to deliver. Just take a look at what s going on with the Ouya.

So, why so many people then donate their money to all of these projects? I don t get your point. Sure there is no real law that pledge you to do anything. But you really think it is so easy? All project on kickstarter have to be in public progress (that’s the idea of kickstarter) and imagine you have get a lot of money from people (I am talking about a sum of 50 000 Dollars and more). I think that will make a lot of presure on yourself. And if nothing is create after a while, I think you really can get in trouble. Sure you can make that all just to create money for your own pocket, but I think the big projects all serious and it is not the fault of the project starter that they get more money than they need (and most project starters expand their project after getting more money then they will get), that only proof that many people think this idea is great.

And what about Ouya? As far as I know there are 20 days left until you can t doante any money for this. And they say Oyua will come out in 2013. Sure you have to trust, but if you think the project isn t serious, you don t have to donate your money. It is up to you.
To be fair, I haven t donate any money yet on kickstarer to anyone, as there was not THE project for me. But if one day there is a project I am really interested in, I can image to donate some money.

Non-existant user wrote:

Besides, we don t need a SWOS remake, we just need a better NETCODE for the original one but since Amiga emulation is apparently extremely complex (and the dude who originally developed the WinUAE has long left the building, unless I m mistaken), no one will ever write Amiga drivers for the most recent emu s and we certainly won t get an improved and compatible version of Kaillera anytime soon either (if ever). So yeah, we re pretty much screwed in that sense.

I agree a better netcode would be nice, but more better it would be to have a more comfortable way of starting the game. So you know anyone that would program something like that? You say no. So that s the idea of this kickstarter thing. No one have the time to create such complex things (or have the passion) on his free time. But if you give someone a job with normal income it will change anything for this person.

Non-existant user wrote:

Also, the XBLA remake tanked so hard, sales-wise, that no producer in their right minds will ever give the SWOS franchise a chance again, not in this lifetime at least.

That is only said because a company have to finance everything. But if you generate all the money by a community, a company have nothing to pay for. So at least the company will not lose money if it doesn’t work out. And for the people that are donate money everyone get what they paid for.

Non-existant user wrote:

Truth being told, those who used to play SWOS on Amigas are getting too old for gaming, whereas younger gamers don t give a shit about gameplay or actual quality anymore, they just want flashy graphics, licenses and CPU-assisted games that basically play themselves (FIFA and PES docet) and as a result there s never more than 100~ people playing SWOS online at any given time and with those numbers you ain t gonna fund no game.

Like any other 2D remake, I think those games are more interesting for the old players or players that is interested in this old style. I think the problem of the XBox 360 game was that it was on Xbox. Besides of Playaveli (as what I read on this forum) I don t know that any players bought a XBox 360 just for SWOS. And after it was found out, that the netcode is worse then the Kaillera Version, more people that was interested in buying a XBox 360 for SWOS wasn t interested anymore in this game. I don t expect, that thousands and thousands are interested in such a game, but it would be really nice to had a modern SWOS game for PC. And why not give it a chance when even more older or unknown games have a chance to generate enough money to produce it?

Playaveli wrote:

I have hopes in a complete java-remake of SWOS, with netplay included. That soccer-stages is great start, Redhair is onto sth..., Bomb does some work. So far, only little steps, but one day the blow has to come!

I have seen that Java game, too and it looks and feel great from what I have seen. That could be a good solution, but is it possible to really recreate the SWOS feeling with a different engine? I m looking forward to the game. Could really good one.

As I know, one day Codemasters give us the right to name the Sensible Days the official SWOS World Cup. Who have made this connection to them?

^^ that was me!

So you had some connections

Are you talking about Kickstarter or about crowdfunding in generel? I just named kickstarter, because this is the most known crowdfunding site.

I think the idea of crowdfunding is wonderful. You have a good idea, but you can t find a sponsor who finances it, so you can ask the community. Sure this is all about trust. I think I get your point. Don t give money to people where you are not 100% sure you get anything back. Sure you can be right and all the people have thrown away their money. I think the aspect of crowdfunding is a little bit different. If you donate money you are like a publisher. You investet money in something where you feel confident. An investing is no coverage that something work or something is already on the right way. But without this investing the idea will never have a chance to be made.

The Ouya reference was merely brought up as an analogy for false advertisement...unless you seriously think that they ll be able to design, build and market a home entertainment system and a gaming network capable of running those kinda games with a whopping 6 mln dollars (pro tip: it s ludicrous).

Maybe it s my bad english, but here I can t agree. As far as I understand, they offer evryone who donate money to this project an own Ouya console. You get hardware wich will run with android and the looking of android will optimized for gamecontroller, so it will looked and mabye feel like a gamingconsole, but basicly it is not more then a tablet pc. That is all what you get. All other have to create by the community if there is one.

Sure it will be very hard for them to really finance it with a price of only 99 Dollars per person, maybe there will be hidden costs (for example you have to pay for activate something or they generate money with accessories that are needed?) or the next revision will be more expensive, who knows. But at first I am sure you get what you paid for.

Maybe the Ouya people will also have some trouble in creating this and it take more time then they think. But that it will be possible is proven by other people that had a similar project in the past. More then 40 000 consoles is a big number and I am interested how they manage to handle all the stuff.

Also good luck finding a talented enough coder capable of writing an effective netcode for an Amiga emulator (or viceversa) or a convincing SWOS clone from the ground up (even Jon Hare gave up on rewriting the game from scratch when they made the XBLA clone).

People like that don t give a damn about neither money nor your kickstarter (since they could get a job anywhere in their field if they didn t have one already), they re driven by passion alone.

A regular publisher on the other hand would just pocket the money and then dish out a mediocre product scrapped together with the least possible resources, which is what Codemaster did back then to milk the franchise.

Who said that it will be easy to find the right persons? But If evryone here in the community think it makes no sence , it is to complex or none is really intressted in a new SWOS version, ok then close this idea becuause this is no one man show of me. I just had the idea: Why not think about what is needed to make a SWOS remake for PC possible after seeing some remakes was financed by crowdfundin. So what is the difference (besides the netcode) from SWOS to games like Larry, a Super Nintendo Shadowrun and Point and Click Adventures?

hm well ...

i think i will try to start some kickstarter event maybe next year.

but atm my time is rare and website at 50% of functions.

so i need 12 months at least to finish website with all functions i want to do.

all old functions and designs of old website and newer functions like team management and automatic savedisk for online career and tournaments

so if i get more help and wont be disturbed with useless stupid stuff it may be faster finished



after that i think i will try to start project management for a professional swos clone.

but first thinks are like that:


- one year of developement
- two coders
- one grahpics
- one project manager


i think with a good plan and maybe 100.000 € it should be really possibe to do that

i know all people i need for that ...

main problem is, that we have a lot of clones of swos

some promising, some less
most of them have the same problems in the end ...
net code, playing style ... and so on ...

as i could see, every clone was made by only one person ....

i think thats really really stupid ....


why we dont start a project together, so everyone could learn from each other.
problems are looking not so big anymore, if you get a second pair of sensible eyes

and maybe i know a very good person for developing a netcode ... even if he does not understand football