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Ryan Jones, Step up to the mic!

So... Big Finish recently posted an interview about Project Fedora with Mr.Jones.

Ryan Jones, that is! :) He has apparently been the/a Project Manager at Big Finish Games all along. And I do believe he is related to the famous... Courtney James. :wink:

I was aware that he worked for TruGolf and plays guitar (I think, anyway-- could be wrong about those). I don't remember hearing much about Ryan during the Kickstarter campaign, unless I'm mistaken. But now we know. I hope we'll be hearing/seeing more from you, Ryan. ♥ Or not, if he doesn't like that.

...Say, he wasn't "Elvis," was he? :mrgreen:
joliet_jane wrote:...Say, he wasn't "Elvis," was he? :mrgreen:
During the UTM CHat they said:
BeekNariz: CJ: Was the James Dean in the Kickstarter video played by your son?

Chris & Aaron: Yes, that Mason, Chris's son.

Adrian Carr: Mason was terrific to work with - a chip of the old CJ block
So I guess that was his other son?

They said a few times on the Kickstarter comments:

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That was after the image of Doug is at his desk with toothpaste, toothbrush and toilet roll :lol:

So I guess Chris *has* to have his whole family there working with him, where else are they going to work if they can't leave the building? :wink: But seriously, its nice that he has his family behind him in this and that they are also talented nice people :)

Just skimmed the article and:
We have a budget of around $750,000.00
I think I read in an interview they put $300k? aside themself. Did some of the 300k already get swallowed up by other things like fees and such? :(
(Ruri_Ayanami from the old Tex Murphy ezboard).
"I don't believe in intuition, don't know why... just a feeling." - Tex Murphy
You've got to remember that there will be a huge cost involved in the physical rewards, as well as the time and effort involved in making half the digital things like the new radio theatre and so on, so perhaps it means $750k towards the game and the rest towards the other things.

But it could also be based on the fact that once released, the largest audience will have paid for the game already, so an extra $300k is a huge investment in something that they might not make much more profit on.

Though of course I hope they do and I'm sure that they will create something that will still be bought several years from now.
David
10% out for Kickstarter/Amazon fees.
That's dropped it as well. 8(
and, perhaps, magnificent 7 contribution
joliet_jane wrote:Mr.Jones.

Ryan Jones, that is!
now we know chris` real name
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Thanks for the responces. Yeah I was thinking probably fees/rewards and such. Still :shock:

Of course they could also be putting a bit aside for future marketing. Which might not be considered funding for the game itself but will also be crucial when its released. They did say in the Reddit session that marketing was one reason Pandora Directive didn't sell as well so I am hoping they really push the boat out on the marketing for this one. :)
(Ruri_Ayanami from the old Tex Murphy ezboard).
"I don't believe in intuition, don't know why... just a feeling." - Tex Murphy
The Banner Saga (which made about 724.000) posted an interesting breakdown for their project today:


http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/sto ... f=activity
Of $730k, 10% immediately comes out for amazon, kickstarter and failed payments. We actually had a shockingly low number of these failed payments, but this alone leaves us with roughly $650k.

Actual prizes cost us about $22k to produce. $22,000 certainly is a lot for posters, tshirts and some fancy art, but this was not a surprise to us since we had gotten estimates and set prices based on that.

Shipping costs are a bit troublesome, especially since we have a fair number of international backers. We estimated that shipping would cost roughly an amount equal to the prizes themselves. When comparing our prices to other kickstarter campaigns we felt that we couldn't ask for more than the standard international shipping rate- between $10 and $20. This helps but does not cover the cost. Now any time I see a campaign asking for an extra $10 for international shipping I just assume they have no idea what they're talking about. That said, it's not like this will cut into our budget by a significant amount with the kind of volume we're pushing. Between prizes and shipping that's another 18% of our total funds.

Once we've dealt with all that business we've got about $600k to work with. I want to re-emphasize that this came as a surprise to none of us!

As for development, contractor salaries take the lions share. We've now contracted (not hired) two programmers, a sound design team, a dedicated composer, a QA specialist, a writer, an interface artist, a community manager and an entire animation production house working for us to produce more content than we ever dreamed at higher quality. That, my friends, is currently where a good 50% of our total funding goes.

We've got the mundane business expenses like a (rather miniscule) office lease, software like adobe products, dropbox and fmod, computer upgrades, and hardware coming out to about 5% of our budget.

We're anticipating the relatively small operation costs of maintaining our own server-side data on amazon's cloud so people can download the game from us and play online without Steam.

Lastly, we've put aside the remaining funding as our safety net which will be re-evaluated as we go. You never know when things are going to go unexpectedly wrong.
We're still not taking personal salaries. We'll be living off our savings until our game starts making income.
So, yeah, 750.000 sounds about right, once fees, storage space, production costs for rewards and a "safety net" are factored in.
Thanks for that. :) Interesting breakdown! The video is cool too (showing all the boxed rewards ready to ship). Would be fun to see what all the boxes of Tex rewards look like at the office.

Someone also posted this on the Tex Murphy Kickstarter comments:
Grant True about 19 hours ago

Just watched the new DFA documentary episode. They are spending $400K on Kickstarter rewards and another $200K in shipping. Add on Kickstarter and Paypal fees and that is more than the total Project Fedora budget!!!
(Ruri_Ayanami from the old Tex Murphy ezboard).
"I don't believe in intuition, don't know why... just a feeling." - Tex Murphy
It might sound silly but I really thought there was no way that CJ and AC would be able to ship directors' chairs with all the other extras for just $20 internationally.
David
There are only 9 $2500 backers, so that's not too big a problem :P

Now that I think of it... if all of the Joneses are in on this, could it be the tail wagging the dog? Maybe it was all their idea? :wink:
you mean, they forced him to do a new game and tell in an interview that he wanted to do this for the past 14 years?!
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Yes, it was a plan that took years of persistence and dedication to bring to fruition. By what means and to what end, we may never know. :|
maybe, kids just wanted to satisfy their ego with the ability to managing the father
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Well, it worked for James Earl Jones' son.
(Ruri_Ayanami from the old Tex Murphy ezboard).
"I don't believe in intuition, don't know why... just a feeling." - Tex Murphy
if it worked, we`d have seen him in cloak and helmet all the time from now on
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