There's no doubt that Kickstarter has become extremely popular for game developers over the last several months. Games on the platform have grown in both number and scale, and today Kickstarter revealed that the 'Games' section of the site currently pulls in more money than any other category.
In the eight months leading up to August 31, video games and board games on Kickstarter have earned a collective $50 million dollars. Other leading categories like Film and Design, meanwhile, have earned $42 million and $40 million, respectively.
That $50 million figure is particularly significant when compared to 2011, when games on Kickstarter only earned $3.6 million. In a recent blog post, Kickstarter said that the real catalyst for this growth was the successful Double Fine Adventure, which raised more than $1 million in its first day.
Ever since Double Fine's game debuted in February, Kickstarter has seen the number of monthly game submissions increase from roughly 100 games per month to more than 200 games per month.
Kickstarter has also noticed that backers who first pledge money to the Games category tend to back more projects than other Kickstarter users, which has helped the games on the platform pull in even more money.
Kickstarter added that since Double Fine Adventure, the Games category has earned approximately $7 million per month. For comparison, games on Kickstarter earned roughly $4 million over the course of the previous three years combined.
I think this is a combination effect, firstly people are desperate for different games which aren't first person shooters and gamers are already used to spending a lot of money on their hobby, so suddenly being able to purchase those games for less than $60 is quite attractive.
Interesting that you use the word "earn" rather than "raise" or "receive". Not sure whether that is the author's misunderstanding of the word in financial speak (it is, after all, being used in a financial context) or whether Kickstarter itself has used it for some reason. Definitely looks odd to me...
.jpg)
Really, Kickstarter is becoming a pre-order channel for games. And that's not entirely a good thing.