Aha, quite welcome! It's been awhile since the last official HIB. Lucky for me, I'm actually interested in most of the ones in here, and the only one I'd already had was Kentucky Rt. 0.

A few numbers, for those inclined to like numbers:

Arithmetic mean of days-between-HIBs: 151 days (5.0 months)
Standard deviation: 62 days (2.1 months)

Intervals between HIBs (in days): 224, 224, 140, 170, 110, 92, 160, 106, 118, 42, 203, 39, 165, 181, 147, 175, 273
Maximum HIB interval (between 17 and 18): 273 days (9.1 months)

Next HIB, if exactly at mean: October 14, 2017
Next HIB, if exactly at mean+stddev: December 15, 2017

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Quoting: DarkMavrikWell from what I noticed of the 200+ Linux games I have the only ones I noticed broke after updating was feral interactive games. SO figured this was an issue with their ports, if not my mistake.

The issue's not limited to Feral (though they're one of the more notable devs whose games are affected) - lots of other binary packages that aren't even games have been affected by this, in fact. If there's blame to be assigned, it'd be on the Arch side, though "blame" is a pretty strong word - it's just a consequence of being on a rather bleeding-edge distro (though I think the original openssl patch which caused the issue came from Debian?)

Feral could certainly push out updates to their games which could fix this on their end, and may end up eventually doing so, though to my knowledge the distributions that they officially support don't have this problem, so it may not be high on their radar (especially when workarounds exist). I really hope that Arch itself will include some kind of official libopenssl-1.0-compat package rather than just relying on AUR for these kinds of things, though I imagine chances are slim since that still hasn't happened.

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Yeah, I really hated the actual "combat" stuff in there, and just couldn't get past it to finish the game. I grew to dread every one of those damned random encounters because it meant that I'd have to do yet more of those bullet hell minigames. Clearly I'm just not really in the target market for the game. I'm certainly glad it found its rather vocal niche, though - it's quite a unique game, whatever I felt about it.

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Didn't Civ5/BE have the slowly-dropping-FPS thing as well? I seem to recall that things would get slower the further you are in the campaign (not that it ever got awful, really).

Alas, in the end my finances are feeling a bit too stretched out over the past month to grab this now (yay for unexpected vet bills and home appliance replacements!) Looking forward to playing this eventually, though!

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Quoting: rkfgUhh, what's up with that non-fully-crossplatform multiplayer? I understand if there are issues with deterministic RTS engines, math could be slightly different on each platform and in the end the butterfly effect causes heavy desyncs. But in a turn-based strategy?.. Weird.

Yeah, it's definitely weird nowadays. I know that the Loki port of SMAC couldn't do cross-platform multiplayer because the protocol that was used on the Windows version literally sent in-memory objects over the wire to the far end (or something along those lines, anyway), which of course would require basically the exact same code on both ends. I can't imagine anything like that happening nowadays, though.

The Steam page doesn't have a "Crossplatfom multiplayer" badge, however, in the system requirements there's a footnote "Additional Notes: NOTICE: It is possible for Mac and PC to become out of sync during updates or patches. Within this short time period, Mac users will only be able to play other Mac users." So, the Mac users can play with the Windows users and Linux users can play only with Mac users. What would happen then if a Mac user hosts a game and then both Linux and Windows users connect? Something's wrong here.

Well, generally with that kind of thing, the systems will just refuse to talk to each other if the versions don't match. That, at least, makes sense - you'd want to have the same game version number for everyone playing the game, otherwise you could have all sorts of weird unintended and unpredictable behavior. There've been many other multiplayer games which have that kind of restriction as well.

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Quoting: Mountain ManI've been saying that for a long time. It's a donation, not a pre-order.

Quoting: Mountain ManIt would be extremely difficult if not impossible for someone to hold a Kickstarter project accountable to these terms to the point that they effectively offer zero protection for the consumer.

This kind of scenario is exactly why mechanisms like small claims courts exist, and if you don't think that that kind of action can be effective, you've clearly never dealt with it. I'm sure there's been, overall, very little actual action in courts about this kind of thing, but Kickstarter's TOS is quite clear: creators are obligated to provide refunds when they don't provide the promised rewards. You're welcome to believe that funding via Kickstarter is a "donation," but you're absolutely wrong. (Unless, of course, you're backing at a level which doesn't actually promise anything.)

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Quoting: SalvatosI always shake my head when I see someone say they'll never use crowdfunding again because they got burned by one project. It's like saying you fell victim to phishing and you'll never use e-mail again. You're blaming the tool and giving up on all the useful things it can do in the right hands.

Yeah, it's definitely a shame. There's a lot of great stuff that happens out there! I've had mostly great luck with Kickstarter as well. I definitely admit that video game kickstarters in particular seem to often be a much riskier prospect than many other kinds of projects out there. There's just so many moving parts with a game, and a few bad decisions at the beginning of a project can absolutely put cross-platform support at risk without the developers even realizing it at the time.

I admit that I don't tend to back video game kickstarters anymore either, even though I've had good luck with the ones I did back (Banner Saga was probably the most egregious of the ones I'd backed - took bloody ages for the Linux port to get out). I still back a hell of a lot of music on there, though, and art books/comics, and board games. Board games in particular seem to often do wonderfully at Kickstarter.

Edit: Ah right! I did back The Journey Down Chapter 3, which is rather overdue, so I suppose technically that one counts as the worst of my experiences w/ videogame kickstarters, though I think that there's still some time before they reach Banner Saga's delivery gap. Just went through my list and I've only got five undelivered kickstarters (of about 60, which I suppose doesn't seem like a lot now that I see it). Though of the five, three are still very openly being worked on (one's actually theoretically shipped out as of a few days ago), and I've only had to mentally write off one of them.

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Quoting: ZaxthThat is a new addition to Kickstarter. Was this in effect during the Carmageddon Kickstarter?
EDIT: It was not, the Carmageddon Kickstarter is from 2012 and Kickstarter updated their TOS in 2014
http://www.kickstarterforum.org/kickstarter-updates-terms-of-service-important-t3255.html [External Link]
As such it doesn't apply to the original Carmageddon Kickstarter.

The TOS changes in 2014 were definitely a needed update to clarify things, but the TOS from 2012 does very clearly state that the project owners are responsible for fulfilling their obligations. Wayback Machine to the rescue! https://web.archive.org/web/20120102004904/http://www.kickstarter.com/terms-of-use [External Link]

Though Kickstarter cannot be held liable for the actions of a Project Creator, Project Creators are nevertheless wholly responsible for fulfilling obligations both implied and stated in any project listing they create.

The original TOS did, indeed, focus much more on protecting Kickstarter itself, but I can't imagine that a body like the BBB, or the state's commerce regulatory body wouldn't consider that to be a binding promise.

There's always been this sort of collective idea that Kickstarter is a charity, as you'd said originally, and that people just give donations in the hopes of receiving something, but that has never actually been the case. It's certainly often a helpful mindset to have anyway - I personally basically adopt that stance whenever I do back something. If I'm not willing to lose the money I put in, I just don't back in the first place. But there has always been the idea that creators are legally bound to provide the rewards you were promised.

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Quoting: fabertaweI backed this one. I've reported them to Kickstarter and requested a refund and guess what... no reply regarding either. How can they get away with this?

Well, one of the critical phrases in the Kickstarter TOS is of course "they may be subject to legal action by backers." Meaning that it is unfortunately up to you, primarily, to go after your refunds. This means you may have to do things like complaints via the Better Business Bureau, Small Claims court, or reporting it to the state where they do business (I don't know off the top of my head which department would typically be most useful for that; I seem to think maybe the attourney general's office would be a place to start. I have seen some successful campaigns waged against fraudulent sellers using that method, though. It'd certainly help to have a group of people making the same complaint rather than just one, in that case.)

Whether or not the tens of dollars you spent is worth the hassle is, of course, up to you, but there ARE options out there, and you're entitled to get your money back if they don't deliver.

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Quoting: ZaxthNo projects on Kickstarter have to deliver to you what they promise, it's like a charity, you can't demand anything from them after giving them money.

That's... actually not the case. From the Kickstarter TOS at https://www.kickstarter.com/terms-of-use [External Link] :

If a creator is unable to complete their project and fulfill rewards, they’ve failed to live up to the basic obligations of this agreement. To right this, they must make every reasonable effort to find another way of bringing the project to the best possible conclusion for backers. A creator in this position has only remedied the situation and met their obligations to backers if:

* they post an update that explains what work has been done, how funds were used, and what prevents them from finishing the project as planned;
* they work diligently and in good faith to bring the project to the best possible conclusion in a timeframe that’s communicated to backers;
* they’re able to demonstrate that they’ve used funds appropriately and made every reasonable effort to complete the project as promised;
* they’ve been honest, and have made no material misrepresentations in their communication to backers; and
* they offer to return any remaining funds to backers who have not received their reward (in proportion to the amounts pledged), or else explain how those funds will be used to complete the project in some alternate form.

The creator is solely responsible for fulfilling the promises made in their project. If they’re unable to satisfy the terms of this agreement, they may be subject to legal action by backers.

Now, I'm not sure how often or successfully that kind of thing has been challenged in court, but you ARE entitled to refunds if a creator defaults on their obligations.

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