By John Walker on June 7th, 2012 at 3:30 pm.
So Tex Murphy will be back. The Kickstarter for the FMV adventure series’ return, Project Fedora, looked wobbly for a while, especially when aiming for a mighty $450,000, but with some pretty inventive updating they’ve managed to tiptoe over the line with still over a week to go.
I have to say I’m delighted about this one. I loved the Tex Murphy games, as much as my attempts to play them today always end after about four minutes of frustration with the horrible engine. The idea of a brand new edition, in an engine that doesn’t require DOSBOX and the remainder of my ground-away teeth, sounds very appealing.
Following a little story where Tex was kidnapped came a project called The Magnificent 7. The former was intended to get them to 4,500 backers, which they claimed was a number they needed to convince some anonymous “high donors” to take part in the latter. Each time another $6k was added, one of these high donors would add in another $4k. This leapfrogging was intended to help them reach the total by next Monday. But as with so many internethings, it happened far more quickly than expected, the total ticking over Thursday morning. And the crazy thing is, as I write this a bit earlier this afternoon than when you’re reading it, they don’t even know they did it yet! They’re asleep, and will wake up to the news.
I think this has been an exemplary example of how to do a Kickstarter, creating fun, silly events to encourage people to donate, without going insanely overboard on the updates. (The Magnificent 7 thing was a touch annoying for those receiving the emails, but mostly because they weren’t expecting it to happen that quickly.) I’m sure we’ll see an update very soon adding on some stretch goals to the front page, as they see just how much more they can raise in the last week.
07/06/2012 at 15:58 LordShaggy says:
HandyMan Studio saying: Congratulations guys!!! Kickstarter is tough and this is clearly an interesting project.
07/06/2012 at 16:13 Jay says:
Well that just brightened up my day a little bit. Sincere congrats on making the target, guys.
07/06/2012 at 16:18 Chaz says:
Why is he wearing 2 shirts?
07/06/2012 at 16:23 stele says:
It’s a button down collared shirt over a t-shirt. Do you live in a desert? We northerners have to do that sometimes.
07/06/2012 at 16:30 John Walker says:
Nah – there’s clearly a second shirt under the first one. My theory: like Superman, Chris Jones is ready to transform into Tex Murphy at any moment, and has to wear the costume underneath his regular clothes.
07/06/2012 at 16:43 westyfield says:
He’s wearing a white t shirt under the brown shirt (possibly a polo) under the black shirt.
It’s a fashion disaster.
08/06/2012 at 02:33 random_guy says:
No, he’s wearing a jacket over a shirt over an undershirt.
07/06/2012 at 17:23 Terragot says:
RPS; vogue conscious since 1873.
07/06/2012 at 17:50 iniudan says:
The fashion police will have to put this under investigation.
07/06/2012 at 17:18 Demiath says:
As evidenced by the project’s Kicktraq stats, there was a mysteriously massive surge on June 6th specifically ($61,000 in one day as opposed to roughly $7,000 the day before, if the numbers are to be believed);
http://www.kicktraq.com/projects/251414413/tex-murphy-project-fedora/ (second graph, Pledges by Day)
07/06/2012 at 17:57 Prime-Mover says:
Perhaps they are funneling donations back in to the project, in order to complete the goal. If they don’t complete it, they won’t get diddely anyway. Whether or not this is possible, I have no idea.
07/06/2012 at 18:48 Phasma Felis says:
Kickstarter doesn’t give you a dime until your kickstarter ends.
07/06/2012 at 19:08 Prime-Mover says:
And from my experience it doesn’t collect a dime until the kickstarter ends. So that is not necessarily a problem. So in theory, what would stop someone like the guys from Takedown, or Tex Murphy from donating a big bunch of $’s to complete the project. The money will get withdrawn and deposited from their account in quick succession, along with all the individual fan donations.
08/06/2012 at 00:53 malkav11 says:
The fact that that is a massive violation of Kickstarter TOS and would get all funding removed even after the close of the project funding period.
08/06/2012 at 00:55 MattM says:
They could do it, but they would instantly lose some of their own money when kickstarter takes %5. They would probably wait until the end. Also if you were willing to settle for 40k instead of 50k, then you should have just made that your minimum goal and set higher stretch goals.
07/06/2012 at 18:24 Fairon says:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=stJy4XPNMkY
07/06/2012 at 22:29 Zeewolf says:
It’s not mysterious, it’s been explained in the article.
07/06/2012 at 18:35 Sparkasaurusmex says:
Was this game that originally came in a box with a flashing LED?
07/06/2012 at 21:55 rustybroomhandle says:
I think you’re thinking of Pink Floyd’s Pulse album http://www.davewoolnough.dsl.pipex.com/floyd/pinkfloyd.html :P
08/06/2012 at 14:30 Sparkasaurusmex says:
Haha that’s cool but this was a sort of noir-comedy detective game.
08/06/2012 at 14:49 Sparkasaurusmex says:
I could have sworn it was Under a Killing Moon… but searching google I can’t find the box in question. Doesn’t seem to be The Dame Was Loaded or Who Shot Johnny Rock or any of the Tex Murphy games…
There was an image of a sky line and a water tower or something had the LED on top, flashing.
07/06/2012 at 20:28 niuxs says:
http://is.gd/PFQQs4
07/06/2012 at 20:40 LionsPhil says:
This pleases me.
07/06/2012 at 21:26 Sic says:
This is beyond awesome. The Tex Murphy games are true classics.
Playing Under A Killing Moon for the first time is something I’ll never forget.
08/06/2012 at 01:01 malkav11 says:
I never got why people thought this project was in danger of failing. They had a massive opening, a steady but slow middle that took them well into success range long before the conclusion of the project, and as these things tend to go, have picked back up again as they approach the final days of the funding period.
08/06/2012 at 10:50 Prince says:
Didn’t support this, but I’m sure as hell going to buy it when it’s released. As a gamer who’s been solving adventures since the first Zork, I still consider Pandora Directive one of the best adventure games of all time. It’s always been a great mystery to me, why this kind of gameplay never really caught on. Just imagine Alan Wake if it had been a Tex-like adventure in the daytime sections!
08/06/2012 at 11:11 Stense says:
Nuts to that E3 nonsense, this is the gaming news that interests me the most at the moment! I loved the Tex Murphy games, it will be a welcome sight indeed to see a new one.