Human Resources, a strategy game from the same team behind Planetary Annihilation, looked cool! There were giant robots and giant monsters. Despite this, and the studio's previous success using the service, the game's kickstarter has tanked.
We normally don't post about every Kickstarter that fails, but this one is a little more interesting. Uber Entertainment had experience with successful Kickstarters, having raised over $2 million from backers. Their pitch looked cool, and was accompanied by gameplay and cinematic footage that gave people a great look at exactly what they'd be paying for.
Yet pedigree and promise counted for little when the game, having barely scratched the surface of its $1.4 million goal, had its campaign cancelled.
The time has come to shut down the Kickstarter for Human Resources. Every Kickstarter prediction model is showing that we will come up woefully short of our goal. Running a Kickstarter is a full time job for several people. As a small indie, we can't continue spending time and money focusing on a project that won't get funded. We simply don't have the human resources. #seewhatididthere
So what happens now? After we've spent some "recovery time," which consists of a dark room and probably some sobbing, Nate and I will regroup and figure out what to do next. Who knows what the future holds for Human Resources? One thing is for sure, Human Resources, as pitched in this Kickstarter, is over. But we adore the world of Human Resources and will endeavor to do what we can to bring it to life in some form.
Whether it was fatigue (Planetary Annihilation only just came out), the name (Human Resources was clever in the context of the game's universe, where humans are the resource, but not great standing alone) or just a bad month to run a Kickstarter (it's the silly season for AAA games), like they say, the game as they pitched it "is over".
I hope it's not over over though. The setting for the game was great, but that art style - especially in a strategy game, of all genres - was fantastic.