Stewart Wieck co-founded White Wolf and co-created the original World of Darkness. It was Wieck who was the editor-in-chief and co-founder of White Wolf with his brother Steve. It was in 1990 that the company merged with Lion Rampant, publisher of Ars Magica and he and Lion Rampant’s Mark Rein*Hagen became co-owners of the White Wolf Game Studio.
Now Wieck is part of Nocturnal Media and trying something new; an augmented reality board game.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1861515217/darkling-plain-an-augmented-reality-miniatures-boa
It’s big money they’re after; $120,000. That’s not computer game money but significantly higher than most tabletop requests.
The challenge is this; gamers want to back successful Kickstarter projects. I’ve been covering Kickstarter pitches for long enough to see the clear trend. The money needs to pile in and this project can never lose momentum.
Geek Native’s just had contact from their PR company (and hiring a PR company is often a wise idea; it implies money enough to do that, for a start) and the total raised is just about $14,000. At that run-rate they’ll double their initial ask.
A concern for me is the hand waving over the technology. Will I actually be able to play this game? I don’t have an iPhone. I’m an Android user. In any case, all platforms are pretty fragmented these days so Nocturnal Media will have a task on their hands creating an app that works on all their backers’ phones and tablets. I suspect they’re not mentioning devices in the text because that would create expectations.
If the technology hurdle is overcome then this should be a great project. It’s the mix of new gaming experience with traditional gaming excellence. Augmented reality is becoming more mainstream as computer games like Skylanders show. Wieck’s heritage is solid.
What do you think? Going to back? Going to wait and see?
