Mooncrest Kickstarter Campaign Launched

The ex-BioWare folks at KnightMayor have launched a Kickstarter campaign for Mooncrest, which asks $400,000 for the development of the story-driven action-RPG. The game is based on three pillars (a core story with two female leads, combat reminiscent of Dark Souls with heavy stamina management elements, and adventure-style puzzles), will be developed on Unity 5, and is based on a trilogy of mods for Neverwinter Nights that was never concluded (the first two chapters, Twilight and Midnight, are still available at the Neverwinter Vault).

Currently the campaign has only raised $22,861 so, unless it picks up the pace, it doesn’t look like there’s much hope for the planned stretch goals, which include a Mac and Linux port of the title at $425,000 and a number of undisclosed further goals. Reward tiers start as low as $5 (a series of simple rewards, such as a forum badge, that doesn’t include a copy of the game) all the way up to a joke $10,000 tier that only includes a t-shirt. The lowest reward tier that includes a copy of the game comes at $30, though there’s also an “early bird” limited tier that includes the same content for $25 for the first 5,000 backers that grab it. Other tiers include rewards such as a digital soundtrack, an art book, beta access to the title, and a number of digital rewards.

However, some of the rewards seem a bit unconventional and ill-advised. For example, I question whether it was a good idea to include the “ability to detect nearby enemies” as a reward in the $175 “Sisters of Battle” reward tier. On the same page, while most of the add-ons seem like common sense Kickstarter standards, there is also one exclusive quests that will only be available as a $25 add-on, provided you have already at least selected the $250 tier. Finally, given I’m speaking of ill-advised decision, I’ll mention two more things: launching just as Gamescom was starting was probably not a very smart idea, as they’ll have to contend with AAA game announcements for the press space, and the Kickstarter video pitch is, well, special. I’ll say that it has to be seen to be believed and leave it at that.