60 replies to this topic

[jerome]

"Who will sponsor and invest in quest making?

 

all would be for zero if the important question of who will sponsor and invest is not answered."

 

 

 

 

Who would make art if it no longer was profitable?  Artists

Who would write songs?  Musicians

Who would create novels?  Authors/storytellers

Who would create Zelda games without financial compensation?  Fans

 

If someone thinks that the only thing that will motivate them to finish what they started is a bunch of people financially supporting them for ease, that person is highly delusional.

 

 

 

Separate from above comments:

Similar to OP:

"Hypothetically," if Nintendo themselves said "We have plans to make another Legend of Zelda, even greater than BOTW, but we need you to pay for it first, so we can work on it.  We are so busy making all of these other games and systems, we just don't have the funding for Zelda, so we need your help to get it going and keep it going.  We believe with enough funding, that we could get this game out in a reasonable time for all to enjoy.  Any financial contributor would get the first release before it hits stores."  (After all, Nintendo is THE "flagship" quest-maker for Zelda.)  Would you support it financially?  What kind of timeframe would you expect your results in?  What kind of timeframe do you think others would expect (reasonable and not)?  What kind of backlash do you think they would suffer when they don't deliver on time and/or a worthy product?

[Shane]

James, I'm pretty sure everyone said "no" earlier in this thread. Especially if it's tens of thousands of dollars as that's delusional of an expectation with such a small community. If you desperately need that kind of money, just get a job.  A true talented quest maker needs not money but creativity and/or time. Such a small amount of money gained from a niche audience will not erase real life responsibilities such as school and work that have plagued many ZC projects. Also many respectable indie developers are making themselves and they have a lot more work to do than we do, if they can do it without begging a single penny, so can a ZC quest creator. But if we're talking about survival, again, a job is a better option for that.

 

Also Nintendo has proven they do not like fan projects that are successful, just look at AM2R and a few Mario and Zelda level recreations that got popular. Pretty much taken down on the spot. Also the countless Mario fan games they went after one day despite them existing for ages. We are safe due to a niche userbase, that's it. Nintendo could strike us if they so pleased at any moment, perhaps if they are to make this "Zelda Maker" which everyone that hasn't discovered ZC wants. Nintendo doesn't want to work with us, you are wrong to think that, there's proof all around which you seem to have not noticed or neglected.

 

We may grow a bigger audience with Steam, but to underestimate the harsh competitive environment of the indie scene would be a mistake on our part. It requires luck in getting serious exposure, not just talent unfortunately. We should hope for the best. Not to discourage though - it's still our best bet regardless I feel. My point is, I doubt Steam could be a game changer to this hypothetical situation.

[klop422]

I was under the impression that part of the point in putting ZQuest on Steam was so that there was a freely available engine for aspiring game designers, which they can use, free of charge, with no worries about licensing or other things. If so, charging what are effectively royalties for games made with the engine is, given the point of the engine and how it's advertised, kind of scummy.

That said, if it's free software (which it is, if I understand), nobody's stopping you from making your own fork of the engine that you can charge as much as you want for. Also kind of scummy, given the point of the project, but perfectly within your rights.

Also, it might be an idea, once this is Zelda-asset-free, to ask for donations. There certainly has been a lot of work put into this, so it would certainly be justified. And, even if you don.'t need the money, people may be willing to give you some. I certainly would, if I had my own income yet . Maybe by the point where 2.55 comes out.

But strong-arming developers into giving you money for something which is supposed to be entirely free is, as I say, questionable.

[Timelord]

Zoria - I just thought of something.  If people are going to try and sell their quests on Steam then you should charge a cut for using ZClassic's engine.  I mean if people are going to make money using your programming skills and effort then its only fair that you take your share of the profits.  If people are going to release stuff for free then its the same deal as is now.
[...]

 
 

[...]
That said, if it's free software (which it is, if I understand), nobody's stopping you from making your own fork of the engine that you can charge as much as you want for. A
[...]

 
 
ZC is open source. Selling the engine itself may be in violation of its license.
 

From the GPLv3 Preamble:
For example, if you distribute copies of such a program, whether
gratis or for a fee, you must pass on to the recipients the same
freedoms that you received.

 

I would interpret this as stating that if you receive the programme and its base at no fee, then you mau not thereafter modify it and charge a fee, but I am not an expect in GLPv3.

 

Even if you could, it would be nearly pointless, because you would be required to distribute the source code. Someone will eventually compile and distribut it at no cost.

 

Someone who wishes to carefully study sections 4, 5, and 6 can make a better determination as to whether it would be legal to convey modified versions for a fee.
 
While I could potentially sell quests, modules, or support; I do not particularly plan to do any of the above.
 
If we ever get ZC on Steam, it'll be free, I don't have ay specific interest in making money on this, in its present format. If I ever decide to make a commercial game from the engine, that is what I'd do. I would never try to put a price tag on using ZQuest, or the quest player.

[James24]

@Jerome.  If you look carefully behind every famous author, artist and musician I think you'll find they are sponsored by a reputable publishing company who have a team of investors who can pay them for their time before their work is published.  These companies take the risk and they are rewarded by the profits that the investee reaps in.  But who are the investors on ZC Quest maker??  And I never said that money alone motivates someone to finish it.  No it is simply a realistic prerequisite for finishing - but fulfulling it does not in anyway guarantee it.  The investor is still taking a huge risk in that sense.

 

If Nintendo were to ask for investors for their next Zelda game yes I would consider it.  All they'd have to do is list it in the public stock exchange and I'd buy up shares in it if I thought it would be profitable.  I'd want my cut of whatever profit they reaped in and I'd want my influence over the game depending on how much of that stock I bought.  If Nintendo does not deliver on their worthy product then I'd just have to suck it in as an investor and accept my losses because I chose to take a risk.  That's how it is - no risk, no reward.  I wonder if anyone else here would do the same...?

 

By the way, you know those devs who work on the official Zelda games?  Who do you think pays them whilst they work on the game?  How much do you think Nintendo pays them - I'd imagine it be in the tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands.  And if they don't deliver on their product Nintendo is just going to have to suck it up as a loss.  That's the way things work.  Do you think they work for free and expect nothing when they publish their work?

 

 

@Shane - No I don't need anyone's money nor am I planning on making a flagship quest to sell to anyone.  I am merely trying to see if there are any investors out there who would be willing to take a bit of a risk and sponsor an aspiring developer who has already proven themselves to be very capable but is held back because of this financial situation.  Otherwise they might have to move on and make a game for a more -generous- audience and that would be a great shame.

[Deedee]

I think another thing to consider is who would even accept being sponsored?

A lot of people don't like feeling like they owe someone something. If they start accepting donations, then someone else could potentially influence their quest in ways they don't want it to be influenced. Let's say Evan wants to make a quest that challenges the people who seek a challenge but provides ways for players of lesser skill to complete the quest; but this hypothetical Evan needs money. James24 comes in and offers to sponsor this flagship quest and Evan accepts; now, however, this hypothetical Evan will feel a subconscious pull to tailor this flagship quest towards James24; which in this hypothetical James24's eyes would be to up the difficulty on the quest to make it only for the toughest players, focus less on the graphics to ensure a faster release, and remove those "cheap nerfs" that allow others to complete the game without becoming more skilled. The quest is no longer the quest that Evan hoped to make, a quest tailored to the audience he wished to please; the quest is now a quest that's tailored to the sponsors, being James24. 

 

Even if the sponsors themselves had the best of intentions, the questmaker would feel pressured by the obligations they feel they'd have to meet; and what if the quest turns out to not work out in the end, or they lose motivation to work on it? Do they have to push themselves to finish it regardless of their enjoyment in order to "meet" their "obligation" to release a quest now that other people's money has gone into it?

 

Real talk: I'm more likely to pay people to work on my quest for me than accept payment to finish the quest myself. Now, a finished product is a completely different story, but even then ZC's audience is so small that I don't want to limit my audience (which is already going to be a fraction of ZC's audience) even further by attaching a price tag to it.

[Shane]

@Shane - No I don't need anyone's money nor am I planning on making a flagship quest to sell to anyone.  I am merely trying to see if there are any investors out there who would be willing to take a bit of a risk and sponsor an aspiring developer who has already proven themselves to be very capable but is held back because of this financial situation.  Otherwise they might have to move on and make a game for a more -generous- audience and that would be a great shame.

I was talking about quest makers that have released critically successful quests.

 

In order for this hypothetical situation to work and to be taken seriously, it needs to be grounded in reality to some extent. Otherwise this is just nonsense and unnecessary of a discussion. You mentioned previously we're talking survival here, and if that's the case, regardless if PureZC is feeling generous or not, we will not be sustainable for your survival. That's simply the situation, not a lack of generosity of PureZC. We also need to take into account that not only is Pure small, most people have expressed they're going through a hard time financially, people even telling stories about going homeless for months. You think PureZC has that kind of money to shower quest makers? Tens and thousands of dollars? If you're currently here only for the prospect of donation money and decide to move on due to a lack of generosity, you shouldn't probably be here in the first place. ZC as it is is a passion project. Go move to the indie scene, you're not going to get tens of thousands of dollars here for a ZC quest, that's just how it is.

 

Also donations are an act of generosity as you put it, and you'd happen to be correct on that. So expecting everyone to dish out their money defeats the purpose. What also defeats the purpose is expecting to be able to control another person's vision because you were generous. If you have to alter their vision to avoid disappointment, maybe it's nothing something to invest in...? Maybe just make your own project if you have a vision. I thought you said it was a risk after all, so let them play into their own strengths they envision. 

[Timelord]

I added a link to the ZCL Source to the zc.com downoads page (required by GPLv3 license, and I had overlooked that, prior to re-reading it), and I added inks to the existing modules for 2.55 to the section for that build.

[jerome]

@Jerome.  If you look carefully behind every famous author, artist and musician I think you'll find they are sponsored by a reputable publishing company who have a team of investors who can pay them for their time before their work is published.  …   No it is simply a realistic prerequisite for finishing - but fulfulling it does not in anyway guarantee it.  The investor is still taking a huge risk in that sense.

You missed my point entirely.  People that are artists/authors/musicians create their medium of art because it is what they enjoy doing.  People that learn how to capitalize off of their talents, just get the added perks.  If the sci-fi utopia of Star Trek:TNG happened, where there is no longer money, people would still create "art" in its many forms.  ZC would probably not have even gotten this far had it been a pay to play fan based quests.  It's draw was that anyone could make a quest, and it was free!  Enter: the artists/authors/musicians.

 

Mozart was composing music for years without compensation, because he enjoyed it.  Later in his life, for a while, he still created music even though there was only notoriety, and little to no money.

 

Van Gogh created over 2,000 artworks, and was considered a failure in his time.

 

I wrote a song without any thoughts of selling it.  I had finished it without any financial backing.  I've also written others as well, with the same outlook.  Why?  Because I enjoy music.  There was a guy at Armageddon Games that played guitar really well, and wrote really good songs without any financial backing.

 

 

Someone thinking that a financial backing is a pre-requisite to create and/or finish works could learn something from history and others.

 

If Nintendo were to ask for investors for their next Zelda game yes I would consider it.  All they'd have to do is list it in the public stock exchange and I'd buy up shares in it if I thought it would be profitable.  I'd want my cut of whatever profit they reaped in and I'd want my influence over the game depending on how much of that stock I bought.  If Nintendo does not deliver on their worthy product then I'd just have to suck it in as an investor and accept my losses because I chose to take a risk.  That's how it is - no risk, no reward.  I wonder if anyone else here would do the same...?

Purchasing stock was not part of the deal, it was you paying Nintendo first so that they would make a game.  This means you pay your $60 for the game and it comes out when they are finished with it, that's it.  You don't get any input to the creation, nor any cut of the profits. You are "literally" only pre-ordering a game that doesn't exist yet (not even a hint of the storyline), in this hypothetical example.

 

 

 

In short:

To make money, ZC is not the way for thee.

You can ask for compensation and support, for what others give for free.

With other engines and routes, some profits you may see,

But to make money, ZC is not the way for thee.

[James24]

@Dimentio and Jerome - if people didn't need sponsorship whilst they make great things so that others can enjoy them, there would be no need for the stock market.  Shares would be useless because people can live on fresh air and water whilst they spend all their valuable time making great things.  The fact that there exists a stock market and that its used by many millions of people attests to the fact that investment is a necessity - a necessity behind any large commitment of human time and effort.  Maybe you'd like to make a flagship quest and see how you survive without financial backing - can be done but as DarkFlameWolf, Peteo and probably Mozart and such can attest, its a very stressful ordeal.  And given that no one has ever made two flagship quests, that probably says a lot about the experience.

 

Purchasing stock is the way society has formalized investment due to how important it is.  An investor purchases stock in a company that is going to make a product that potentially sells for profit.  The director of that company then distributes those investment funds to pay the employee's salaries whilst they work on the product.  If/when the employee's make a viable product that sells for profit then the investor reaps in their share of the profit.  So if Nintendo was short of funds for the situation you described above they would list their shares on the stock exchange and anyone who thought that Nintendo would make a profitable product would invest in them now in the hopes of making a profit when the game was released.

 

That's how it works.  Everywhere else but in ZC.  You can go to armorgames.com and see how they make games.  Armorgames sponsors the developer whilst they are making the game.  When they make the game, armorgames puts ads on it and releases it to the public for "free".  People watch the ads allowing armor to recover their investment and there are in-game purchases which allow people to buy optional stuff if they want.  Nintendo when they first started up needed an investment of capital otherwise we wouldn't have even seen the first Zelda game.  I don't get it, everyone likes to replicate Nintendo and their Zelda games right?  So why not replicate the financing aspect of it?

 

As for quest makers quitting or cancelling half-way.  Well, that kind of risk comes with the territory.  If you invest, you take the chance that the quest-maker is going to quit half-way.  Just as the quest-maker takes the chance that the investor is going to quit half-way.  Investment is not for the faint of heart and involves a lot of courage.  As for being paid for only the finished product, its not really that much different except that the quest maker is paid only when the quest is finally done.  But they would still be subconsciously pulled towards what their future would-be clients tastes are when making the quest.

 

 

@Shane - my quest is critically successful.  Critically successful to me and my tastes that is.  Others views are only important if they are backed by sponsorship or important help of some kind.  If I was being paid to make a quest for a sponsor who liked easy mode though, LoH and LoH:IE would be very different quests than they are now.  And survival in the tens of thousands is reasonable over the life of a flagship quest.  If you spend a lot of time making a flagship quest in two years, do you think you can live on, say, $30,000?  Possible but it won't be very comfortable if you don't have any other income.

 

As I said, I had to try and see if there were any other investors out there like me.  People with spare cash and willing to take a bit of a risk in the hopes of a nice payoff, either a nice game or if sold on Steam a nice profit.  I guess there isn't.

Edited by James24, 05 February 2019 - 12:46 AM.

[Shane]

@Shane - my quest is critically successful.  Critically successful to me and my tastes that is.  Others views are only important if they are backed by sponsorship or important help of some kind.  If I was being paid to make a quest for a sponsor who liked easy mode though, LoH and LoH:IE would be very different quests than they are now.  And survival in the tens of thousands is reasonable over the life of a flagship quest.  If you spend a lot of time making a flagship quest in two years, do you think you can live on, say, $30,000?  Possible but it won't be very comfortable if you don't have any other income.
 
As I said, I had to try and see if there were any other investors out there like me.  People with spare cash and willing to take a bit of a risk in the hopes of a nice payoff, either a nice game or if sold on Steam a nice profit.  I guess there isn't.

Since you've misunderstood my post, I am going to clarify a few things:

 

1. By critically successful quests, I meant things like Greatest Hits and Ratings this entire time. Almost everyone sees their quests as successful, it's not out of the ordinary.

2. I am not arguing that kind of money isn't survival money. I am doubting PureZC will ever see that kind of money for a single project due to how small it is and how many people are surviving themselves. And even adding the fact that most people haven't given a "yes" to the idea of sponsorships.

[Deedee]

Maybe you'd like to make a flagship quest and see how you survive without financial backing - can be done but as DarkFlameWolf, Peteo and probably Mozart and such can attest, its a very stressful ordeal.  And given that no one has ever made two flagship quests, that probably says a lot about the experience.

If I were to finish any flagship quest, money wouldn't be my big issue; people paying me money for ZC would stress me out even more. Tell me: can money get me good grades without studying? Can money cure depression? Can money get me to stop being a procrastinator at heart? Probably not.

[Eddard McHorn Van-Schnuder]

Can I just say that if anyone invests money into a quests with the hope of seeing a return profit, I reserve the right to physically slap them really hard across the face three times, both ways. And if anyone just gives money to quest makers so that they can... do what they're already doing? My god, then we are doomed as a society.

[klop422]

I should just point out that we here in the wonderful land of PureZC are kind of infamous for not finishing quests - or at least that's the impression I've gotten. One of the memes here last year was "Eddy Finish AR3", and Shane mentioned in his post about being here a decade that he's finished one quest in that time. (Just to be clear, I'm not trying to single you guys out, you're just good examples ). I've been working on my own quest since October 2012. That's six years and a bit.

Sure, some of us are really good at making a ton of quests - Avataro's made a few, Shoshon certainly seems very good at doing stuff comparatively quickly, Joelmacool's made the DayDay series - but that's certainly not the norm. And some of us only make one big quest and then lose interest or whatever. And there certainly are a decent amount of good quests coming out every year.

None of this is a bad thing, because we have such a casual community. If we were here designing actual games to be sold to the actual game market, maybe we'd be better at working hard on them. But the whole way this community works doesn't really encourage 24/7 work, because, as others have said, this is, for pretty much everyone here, a free-time thing.

That's not to say that it couldn't be in the future (especially when by the time ZQuest 2.55 gets released) but for now, it's really just a casual thing with a bunch of casual people. For now, when someone sticks around for a couple decades and has one and a half games to show for it, maybe paying them to make games is not a good use of your money.

Also, I accept the possibility that perhaps if people were making some kind of money off this, then maybe they'd work harder. But, again, as others have said, many people here don't have the ability to pay money for someone else to make a game, when they're struggling to pay for their own livelihood or education or something. Again, that circles back to the fact that we're such a casual community. But the fact that nobody here is that serious about this (again, not saying we're not serious about this, but, given the current lack of monetary interest, it's a hobby) probably also means we're not scaring away those who aren't that serious about it. If you guys were all proper indie devs, then I might be a little uncomfortable about my 6.4-year-and-counting development time, with breaks. As it is, I wish I were more productive, but it's fine because nobody's really judging me for it, and also I have about 600 projects ongoing right now.

 

tl;dr even accepting crowdfunding, PureZC is not the place for it. As everyone else has pretty much said.

[Chris]

If i had lots of money, i most likely would show my appreciation for some quests through donations. Like helping with useful software that isn't free. If. But i don't.