Stormgate crowdfunding for physical collector’s edition smashes goal in 15 minutes
While the development of Stormgate, the upcoming free-to-play RTS created by Frost Giant, has been fully funded thanks to a high interest among investors, the studio launched a crowdfunding campaign on December 5, 2023, to finance some additional elements requested by the growing community of fans – among them the capabilities for enlarged beta testing as well as a physical collector’s edition for the game.
“This Kickstarter is in part a response to fan requests for a way to purchase a physical Collector's Edition of Stormgate. (...) We have also received countless requests for beta access. Scaling online multiplayer testing for a massive audience can get very expensive – beyond what we can support without additional funding,” the company reasoned in the campaign’s description.
Aiming for a modest sum of $100,000 USD, Stormgate smashed right past that goal in under 15 minutes. At the time of writing Frost Giant has crowdfunded over a quarter of a million dollars from this campaign.
Containing a whole bunch of digital goodies on top of enameled pins, a coin, and a 6.5” statue of the Vulcan, the game’s posterboy unit, the collector’s edition can be had for $200 USD. A more expensive $350 version coming with staff signatures and a mention in them credits has already been sold out. Various digital packages are available as well for those who wish to back the title with a more affordable sum.
Frost Giant has set out a variety of stretch goals into which the surplus money will be invested: An arctic tileset and a HUD skin as well as additional weekly modifiers for the 3vE co-op mode and a player assist tool have been funded this way. Next up would be a beta test for the 3v3 mode and finally expanded bot personalities for the game’s skirmishes. The campaign is going to be open for 57 more days.
The high interest in the campaign shows that Frost Giant, a team consisting of former StarCraft 2 and Warcraft 3 developers, has built an extremely loyal base of fans in these hardcore RTS communities. Whether the game will be able to fulfill the high expectations is another matter.