Author Neal Stephen has launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds for a realistic sword fighting game, and while that's certainly awesome, the pitch video is something else altogether.
Neal Stephenson, author of amazing novels like Snow Crash, Cryptonomicon, the Baroque Cycle, and a bunch of others, has said "screw that" to writing more, and wants to make a video game instead. A video game about sword fighting. A video game about sword fighting using a motion-control peripheral. A video game about sword fighting using a motion-control peripheral that will have freely available tools for anyone to use if they want to add new content. Aside from standing between two dudes juggling knives, kicking the crap out of a random assailant, and effectively shitting all over standard console controllers as an acceptable device for playing games realistically, Stephenson's amazing pitch video features a cameo of a certain famous game developer. It's really something you need to see RIGHT NOW.
At $500,000, Stephenson's Subutai Corporation isn't asking for chump change, but considering the Kickstarter has been up for all of a day and has already raised over $71,000, I doubt they'll have a problem exceeding their goal. The game, called CLANG, aims to bring a certain aspect of realism to sword fighting, and by making use of a cheap, "low-latency, high-precision motion controller", Stephenson and Co. can make a game where timing and skill are the motivating factors of most battles. Stephenson has a serious respect for the sword fighting arts of the world, and aims to make a game that represents the skills inherent in fighting with real swords! Add to that a set of dev tools that will allow anyone to add new content to the existing sword fighting engine, and you've got a rather amazing project from some incredibly talented people, with the aim of developing a platform with the potential of supporting an enormous amount of content.
I already funded the project. Why haven't you?
