I’ve made it no secret that I do not approve of the way most game developers are using kickstarter, that is, as a way to double-dip on their fans. I’ve also always said that something that is publicly funded, should be publicly owned as well, by which I mean that the end result should belong in the public commons, which at the moment means Open Source and Creative Commons for code and art respectively.
So to my grand delight I had the chance to put my money where my mouth is by supporting Haunts: The Manse Macabre. They are not only going to release the source as open source (under the BSD license) but also all the assets as creative commons. This is great news, both for the culture, which will be able to reuse and improve on that base, but also for the game itself which will open itself to be extended by the public.
The game has already been funded, and now there’s a few days left to put some money towards adding more content, which makes sense to support given that we get to use it in the game as well as to make it part of the commons.
So what are you waiting for. This is the kind of game that needs all the support it can get. I do hope to see this become the norm in the future as well as the benefits to me us a supporter increase exponentially the more such games are made and passed to the commons, given how easier it will become to see more games built upon those foundations.