‘Pathfinder Dice Arena’ Kickstarter Cancelled

Just to show simply attaching “Pathfinder” to a gaming title isn’t always going make the release a winner with fans of the RPG, Fun to 11 has cancelled their Kickstarter project which aimed to publish Pathfinder Dice Arena. Although the project had surpassed the funding goal, feedback from gamers (and those who were backing out of their pledges after having second thoughts) Fun to 11 decided maybe a dice based game wasn’t the best direction for their company.

The announcement:

Hey backers,

Fun to 11 has decided to stop the Pathfinder Dice Arena Kickstarter campaign, and not move forward with production of the game. The reasons are not financial – we’ve more then met our funding goal. We are ending the project based on feedback from the Pathfinder community.

While we think the game is excellent and fun to play, it is not the game play experience Pathfinder fans are looking for. It’s an interpretation of the Pathfinder characters through the lens of the game mechanics, but the game mechanics themselves just aren’t Pathfinder-y enough for a lot of Pathfinder fans.

The Kickstarter campaign has successfully funded, and it reached several stretch goals. But, we have also seen a significant number of canceled pledges. After speaking with lots of those who cancelled, many mentioned the monetary pressures of the holiday season, but much of the feedback from them has been that they realized Pathfinder Dice Arena wasn’t the Pathfinder game they were looking for. We took that feedback to heart, and decided we agreed – the game is super fun, but it’s not a good fit for Pathfinder.

My favorite part of Kickstarter is that you get to test out an idea. It lets you find out what the audience thinks before you pull the trigger on producing the idea. Audience feedback on this campaign pointed to a future with a lot of unhappy retail purchases, and no one associated with this game wants to be part of that even if it means we leave money on the table.

What’s next? Well, we’re going to regroup after the holidays and see what makes sense. We honestly haven’t thought too far ahead as we’ve been focused on the campaign.

Thanks for your support. We really appreciate it and although it’s disappointing we won’t be delivering PDA to the backers who did want it, we hope that you all understand the reasons we made the call. It was not easy that’s for sure. Pathfinder is a great brand we love with a dedicated following, and we don’t want to disappoint players who would be willing to give PDA a chance at retail simply because it had the name “Pathfinder” on it. This was Fun to 11’s decision, not Paizo’s – who have been great and supportive partners the whole way.

We do believe strongly in the Kickstarter community, and we hope to see you on one of our future projects and/or other creators’ projects (like TOE2 which I backed a few days ago – a nice mix of match 3 and tower defense!).

Thanks everyone, and we hope you have an excellent holiday season and a great end to 2013!

Luke, Dave, Kai, Jay, and Jordan of Fun to 11

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Jeff McAleer

Founder/Editor-in-chief of The Gaming Gang website and host of The Gaming Gang Dispatch and other TGG media, Jeff tackles any and all sorts of games but has a special fondness for strategy, conflict sims, and roleplaying games. Plus, he's certainly never at a loss for an opinion...

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