The Ship sequel changes course for Steam Greenlight Concepts after Kickstarter fails

The people behind The Ship sequel have changed course for Steam Greenlight Concepts after its Kickstarter failed.

Developer Blazing Griffin had called for £128,000 to make The Ship Full Steam Ahead, but only managed to raise £18,247.

“As the days ticked by it became clear we wouldn't make our Kickstarter target,” a statement on the Blazing Griffin website reads. “Are we disappointed? Most certainly, yes, but we've also learned a lot from the experience.”

The developer reckons one of the reasons the Kickstarter failed was because those who hadn't played the original weren't sure what Full Steam Ahead was all about, and its effort to correct that perception came too little too late.

Other problems included issues with conversion rates tied to running a Kickstarter in the UK.

“There's a subliminal type of mark-up for non-UK backers," Blazing Griffin explained. “If you fund a Kickstarter in dollars, say $25, you may see this as pounds, and be delighted when you only have £20 deducted from your account. In the US it works the other way round, so £20 would be $32 (at time of writing) giving the impression you're giving more for less. We'd have loved Kickstarter UK to be seen in dollars across the rest of the world so, if you're listening Kickstarter, could you consider this?”

Now, the game is on Valve's Steam Greenlight Concepts page, used by small teams to gain feedback from potential customers and build a community.

“People like the idea, love the concept art, have a forum where they can talk to us about our plans and pushed us into the top three Steam Greenlight Concepts of all time in under a week,” Blazing Griffin said.

“If it's proven anything to us it's that enough people are interested in a sequel, so we would be foolish to give up now. Its time to regroup, learn from the feedback across a variety of sources and make sure that the next funding strategy has the substance people require to back this kind of project but also harness the public excitement and imagination we know exists from the Steam Greenlight Concept.”

It appears the Kickstarter set-back will delay development of The Ship sequel as the studio embarks on other projects to help establish itself.

And there are other options: “There are certainly other funding models and strategies we can follow but we would not be the first project to return to Kickstarter and be successful on a second attempt. We have put a lot of time, thought and energy into the project and will look for other ways to develop it whether its through another Kickstarter campaign at a later date or through a funding model like Natural Selection 2/ Interstellar Marines.”