Sociable Soccer Cancels Kickstarter, But Is Still Coming
Due to lack of interest
Retro revival Kickstarters are interesting ways to find out quite how much people want an old game or genre to return, and how much they miss being young. Remember Sensible Soccer, yeah? On the Amiga, yeah? Your mate Steve would come round after school and you'd play Man U vs. Tottenham and drink blue raspberry Panda Pops and eat Jammie Wagon Wheels? What's Steve up to nowadays, I wonder? Must be years...
Nostalgia for Sensible Soccer apparently was not strong enough, as designer Jon Hare has cancelled the crowdfunding campaign for his modern follow-up Sociable Soccer. But development's continuing and publishers are interested in picking it up, he says.
With two weeks down and two to go, the Kickstarter had only received £32,498 in pledges towards the £300,000 goal. As usual, if they didn't get the lot, they'd receive nothing. It seemed pretty clear they'd receive nothing. So they've cancelled the Kickstarter, and are continuing to work while trying to figure out how they'll finish it.
Hare told Eurogamer that they have a prototype which "already plays amazingly well". Perhaps that could've helped lure people into the Kickstarter, but playing not-remotely-finished games can also put off folks who expect more.
He also said that Sociable Soccer generated "a great press buzz" but there was a problem in "persuading enough readers from press articles to click on the link to view the Kickstarter page in the first place". Which appears to be him saying games press are uncommonly excited about Sensible Soccer? Yeah, that's probably true.
Other olde arcadey footie games already exist, if you want retro kickballing now. Some happy soul pointed out these when we first posted about Sociable Soccer. Heck, Sensible World of Soccer 96/97 is on GOG too.