One of the oft asked questions we have come across has been about what the money we are aiming to raise through the Kickstarter is for; what we intend to do with it. After all, $320,000 is not chump change to most people.
Our first cost are the fees for the Kickstarter itself. This comes to about 10% of the total. Then there are taxes, which we estimate can run us up to 12% of the total. So right off the bat, before anything else, we have roughly $70,000 removed right away. Then we have the royalties for the game engine, which will run us another $70,000 (both numbers are rounded). This cuts $140,000 off of the total, right off the top, leaving $180,000 with which to do anything else.
From that $180,000, we have a lot of software to purchase, the most expensive being Autodesk's Maya and 3DS Max. Each of them has strengths and weaknesses, and we need at least 24 copies between the art team of various forms. Some need the basic version, others need more capable forms due to the tasks they have. Then we have tools such as zbrush, Allegorithmic, 8DIO, Photoshop and Illustrator. Then we have the costs for the website servers.
We may not have any employee costs, being volunteers. But this as a result has given us a lot of people which we need to support. Some have the tools needed, most don't. We have a lot of people who only have student versions of applications, and they need full versions before they can make finished game assets.
The Kickstarter is to get these people the tools needed to deliver quickly. We have found, using 30 day trials granted by Autodesk and Adobe, is that these tools truly do improve our productivity. And that is why the Kickstarter.
We thank each and every one of you for your support. We would not be here if it were not for you.
Technical Director
Read enough Facebook and you have to make Sanity Checks. I guess FB is the Great Old One of the interent these days... - Beamrider
Wow...once you've added them all up, fees are NASTY (I'm lumping tax into that statement)
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[center][color=#ff0000]Interior Map Lead and UI Designer[/color][/center]
Yeah I assume that after the collection, you all either have or will get the service of a person that is *certified* experts in the tax portion. Last thing needs to happen is under estimate and have the IRS on your case. Or pay more than you need to in taxes.
In a sense, the taxes are the easy part. There are plenty of corporations that that take in money and pay taxes. There are legions of people who know how to deal with it.
Creating an MMO with a bunch of volunteers, on the other hand, is kinda new.
[color=#ff0000]Composition Team[/color]
[img]http://missingworldsmedia.com/images/favicon.ico[/img]
yup. And not because it's volunteers or creating an MMO. I don't think the IRS have separate category for MMO. But crowd funding in the likes of Kickstarter is relatively new which probably be more or an essence to make sure it's right.
No problem -- you guys are heroes; this is what you do.
Spurn all ye kindle.
Licenses are expensive, I know I pay some of them at my work. Our Microsoft renewal is over a million every 3 years x_x
They want to do this the right way, everything legit & above board. Keep up the good work & thanks for the updates!