I’ve done a few of the Kickstarters, a d pre-ordered a couple of RPG books over the last year or so, hoping to help companies and lines I like stay alive. I’ve noted, however, a truly annoying tendency lately for gaming companies to keep bumping their ship dates.

Catalyst did a great job with their Transhuman kickstarter — the book was on time and quite nice. One got the impression that the piece was in the final stages when they went to the public for cash.

Others have been an exercise in frustration. One of the other ended well funded close to a year ago. Still no product and every update — though they have been good about keeping the supporters in the loop — pushes the product back further.

Another was a preorder that was due in May…I mean June…I mean sometimes if the moon is opposition with the house of whatever. PDF: out. Book: not so much. Same with another game book I was part of testing

These examples show a few issues with game companies. They are perpetually underfunded, so the people have real jobs. That means they aren’t too focused on their product. They make promises they don’t keep because their time management sucks, or they spent the funding on that new deck instead of art, or because they have a licensed property and should know what pain i the ass it is to deal with entertainment companies. It’s not all their fault…but it is also not not their fault.

I finally cancelled my pre-orders of the physical books for several of these games. I’ll see if they actually get to market, and I’ve got the PDFs. This is an object lesson that could have been learned by studying the history of the innovative Bren Ten pistol by Dornhaus & Dixon. They promised a fantastic new product and couldn’t get the gun to market fast enough, or with enough magazines for the weapons. People pulled their orders after a long wait. D&D died, and the Bren with it.

Don’t make promises you can keep. Don’t keep the people with the money waiting. There’s always another game to fund or buy.