This is a thought I developed for some time now, and I guess it is more speculation, as this is not up to us, but Konami themself.

For those who do not know what crowdfunding is: Basically, a gaming/movie/music company wants people to give them money for a project (in this case, a new Suikoden). The company sets a minimum of total donations (e.g. 1 Million $) and the project will start as soon as this goal is reached. People make their donations and will get bonusses according to their donation. E.g. a 10$ donation will get you a discount if you'll purchase the game later on, a 20$ donation will give you a free digital copy of the game + discount on physical copy, 60$ donation will give you free artbooks, 5000$ names a SoD after you... and so on.

This is a method which becomes more and more prominent, especially in the indie gaming/music/movie scene. Examples are Iron Sky (movie) or the Angry Video Game Nerd movie. For more information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crowd_funding

So this is the basic outline.

What I want to say: Suikoden is a niche series and every new entry to the series might be a financial risk for Konami: they can't predict sales, so they maybe want to save money which might decrease the quality of the final game, or maybe Konami will decide to not produce a new game at all.
But if they'd say "Hey Fans, we want to make a new Suikoden game for PS3. Production costs will be 10 Mio $, so we would like you to donate a quarter of it to get this game released and save its quality."

If you say there are ~500k people interested in the Suikoden franchise world wide and maybe 200k of themwould be willing to donate at least 5$, 1 Mio $ are a really, really easy goal to achieve, and I guess 2 Mio would be possible too. I mean 10$ for everyone is not much, and you'll even get something as a reward.

Additionally, they could use this for other projects. An official Suikogaiden translation for PSN, PSN releases of all old Suikoden games... whenever Konami needs money, they could think of a way to minimize risk by fundraising. Or only EU/US Konami use this to get money for translations.

BUT (and this is a really big but) - this can only work if Konami would be more open with fans and be willing for real discussions with fans. Fans are only willing to give money when their opinions are heard and they can somehow be involved in the creation process. Fan projects like KC_MCDOHL has started on Facebook and fan sites like suikosource will of course help in the process.

This has become a rather long post and I hope it is comprehendable. This is all a theoretical discussion, because in the end, it is up to Konami to do something like this. Sooo... your opinion?

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My opinion is you can't do that for Suikoden because fans are too narrow-minded now.

Fans will give money to get a Suikoden they like. Too many people won't like it by the end of the development.
The crowfunding can be good for new games/movies/musics or ones which had consistant quality.

Using that but for a sequel from a series so uneven like Suikoden one ?
Really, what do you think if they used it for Tierkreis or the last one ?

Hm, ok, that's a good point. That's why I think Konami should also increase their fan contact to get a feeling what the fans want.
This system only works if you work with the fans/donators, not against them or to a different goal than they want. So Konami has to change their way how they deal with Suikoden fans (they should change their behaviour anyway, imo)

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That's utopic but industry doesn't work like that, and anyway, I don't think it can work like that even if they chose to do it.
I mean, we have a good example today with Blizzard and Diablo III. It has nothing to do with Diablo II and this is what fans hoped.

We are fans and we are not objective. Konami has to do their Suikoden as they want.
I agree, though, they should increase their fan contact if it's not good enough (actually I don't know how it is in Japan), but they still have to do what they want about the series. After all, that's their game, and their license.
If Konami likes Suikoden series, they shouldn't make huge mistake. Unfortunately, the multiverse concept was just an heresy because it was completely useless and we have to wonder what is their goal with the series.

For me, Konami sees Suikoden as low funds title and thus, that's easy money to get in case other games, more risky, get bad results. Suikoden never had big funds, even Suikoden V (money is usually saved on graphics).

But, at the end, if we liked a game, we buy the sequel. If we didn't like it, we don't buy the sequel. That's nothing else.

You can think I'm pessimistic. Not really (well a little >.>), it's just I think it's not because we are fans that we can have the best point of view.

I like this idea.

I take it you've been thinking about Double Fine's recent success on Kickstarter as a good example for this.

I would love nothing more than to see this come to light. Really, I do. Unfortunately, I think you're estimating this wrong numbers here. Most titles on the 360 and PS3 cost upwards of $20 million to make. As far as active Suikoden fans go, the number is more likely around 300k, many of whom have resorted to piracy in recent years to secure copies and may not have the income to spare for this.

So I guess what I'm trying to say is that I believe this to be unfeasable.

On the other hand...

This would be a great opportunity to provide fans with something else they've been clamoring for: 2D HD remakes of the original games. Let's face it, so much damage has been done to the series in the past few years that releasing Suikoden VI just isn't a wise and viable option anymore. Before any such game can be released, we need to reintroduce gamers to the franchise. PSN, XBLA, even Steam can serve as great delivery vessels here. Before the franchise can continue, it needs to be reborn. While such digital titles aren't as cheap to make as they used to be, they are still far more affordable than making a fullscale console game.

I agree... totally. Suikoden I and II (and even III) remake would be awesome. Else, that's probably too late to make a Suikoden VI.
Disgaea 4 shows how good 2D can render in HD.
Like Final Fantasy I remake, Suikoden I should have addition though, because that's unfortunately not long enough today. Nothing necessarily huge needed. Including Eike's Tournament from Saturn and extending it could be a good idea or adding some mini-games from useless characters (cook, smiths, gardener, etc.).

Yeah, I'd probably more support a remake than an uncertain Suikoden VI.

Ok, that's a great idea, too. Anything thinkable might be possible with this. Digital releases of all the older titles, I'd even give money for them to release all official mangas in English. Or, as I said, also official translations of the Gaidens and Card Stories and making them available in PSN/WiiStore/DS-Store...

@Xelinis: I searched and found that an average PS3 game costs 10-20 Mio $. A DS game, in contrast, costs "only" up to 1 Mio $ so maybe a handheld spin-off in the vein of Tactics might be better for this kind of thing!?

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I love this idea.

I came up with something smilar a couple of years back:

http://www.suikosource.com/phpBB3/viewt ... 36&t=11630

But the idea did not seem to resonate with anyone back then. This would be my next objective if Konami refuse to listen to the Suikoden fandom and/or we cannot get another company to buy the rights to Suikoden.

I think this is definantly feasible. However my main worry is on what others have said already. With an active Suikoden community of low numbers, and probably even lower numbers for those who are willing to contribute, then I think we'd be struggling to gain around $200,000 rather than £1m. However, its the the thought that counts and I certainly think Konami are more willing to listen to a cheque from thousands of people rather than emails from thousands of people.

Also, as others have said, I think we need to establish a better relationship with Konami first so we can all work together to bring out the potential in Suikoden that we all want to see. It would be foolish to throw money at Konami and they still don't make the kind of games we want. Although, initial discussions with Konami would have to take place in order to set up something like crowdfunding. So we could lay down our suggestions/hopes/fears/concerns/demands(lol) to Konami before committing to anything.

I totaly agree that the older installations in the series probably need to be re-vived and gain new interest before we see Suikoden VI. An idea like crowdfunding could actualy be a great asset to re-releases/digital downloads of the older instalations.

Wether we do this or not, I still think inmproving the fan/Konami relationship is the most important thing to achive just now (in terms of steering the series back on track). First of all, I will wait to see if the new Suikoden is released outside of Japan. Then, I will see if they contact us (like they did with Tierkries). Then I will know that I have been listened too.

Sorry, I'm rambling now. Going of on a tangent and forgetting what thread I'm discussing lol

Yes, I think this is a great idea. And I will fully support it, when the time is right.

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I certainly like this idea. I'd donate $50 easily as long as they preserve the story and quality. However, I'd say so much as start out own donation ring. http://www.indiegogo.com/ is a great site for this. We ask for donations and offer perks. I say we try to raise the money ourselves, and I say us as in Suikosource because recently it has become the sole haven for suikoden fans and the most active in my eyes.

So what do you think? If every member donated $10 on here... then we all passed it on to our affiliate websites.. and then everyone shared it on their facebook. I think we could easily get the money.



-V

I think this has to be done by Konami and not the fans themselves. I wouldn't give just someone who is just a fan 10$. Also, without a project in mind, I wouldn't donate anything, either.

I'd, however, give a translation group mony to translate the novels and encyclopedia

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||Suikoversum.de - The German Suikoden-portal||

I think it's an interesting idea, but I really don't see it working out for this. Personally, I wouldn't give money to Konami because I don't trust how they would handle it. Even if they could put together a decent marketing strategy (something that seems far beyond their capabilities), I don't think I'd trust them to make the game what it needs to be. I wouldn't pay in advance for so much uncertainty. Show me a finished product I'd like and I'll buy it then.

Now that translation idea sounds pretty good, though.

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Pretty much what I was thinking. In order for this to work Konami would have to scale the game WAY down...to the point where most hardcore Suikoden fans would be dis-satisfied with the product.

I'd rather see Konami shell out the cash to actually develop a good Suikoden game and market it correctly. Which won't be for the foreseeable future. If they really wanted to do it they probably already have the capital necessary to make it happen. With fan donations my cynical side tells me they would just slap together a mediocre team to create a mediocre Suikoden product. No thanks, I'll pass.

Hopefully the new Silent Hill and Metal Gear games are huge hits so the company has a bunch of extra cash to shove around to other projects.

Yeah, i think some serious discussion with Konami would need to take place before we commit to anything. What are peoples opinions on using the crowdfunding to help pay for lower budget, digital release Suikoden games in the style of Suikoden I and II?

I really like the idea of paying translators to do the novels

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You mean like Suikoden 6 and sequels only in digital release and graphically like suikoden I & II ?
I'm not really enthusiastic about that for many reasons.
First, the digital copies could give an access issue to foreign countries. I mean, I'm french, so what happens if it's released in Japan and USA only ? I gave money for nothing... We have such an example with Suikoden I & II on PS Store. Suikoden I is in Japan and USA, and Suikoden II only in Japan if I'm not wrong. I'm talking as european, not french only. I'm not asking for french localisation, english is enough (this point of view could not be shared by other french folks though -_-).

Then, I'm afraid Konami will take digital copies and graphics excuses to release sub-games. If those games have poor graphics, then the least we can hope is a good story.

Finally, Suikoden I & II graphics could be good... for old fans. Unfortunatly, I think it won't bring a new community to the fanbase and that's not really interesting (and probably a bit selfish, but who cares ). I won't dislike some Suikoden I, II or III side-story games (same times, same countries, some recurrent characters but parallel events), but we could actually do them ourselves (talking about fans in globality) with RPG-Maker and motivation.

So, like you can read, I find the crowdfunding solution applied to any new game too uncertain (I'm conjecturing a lot and that's only my opinion).

On the contrary, I like this idea for licensed projects. Funding Suikogaiden, Encyclopedia or novels translations, remaking Suikoden I or II in HD? Why not.
About the manga, I'm shared. As french, comics are an institution (and the manga medium has exploded those last years) so usually there is often an editor to release them. I don't really know how mangas are seen in other countries.