PayPal backers won’t get Shenmue 3’s Kickstarter rewards

Developer Ys Net has, thanks to what appears to be a bizarre data interpretation, decided that its PayPal backers will not be given the same treatment as its Kickstarter backers.

The studio decided to poll fans over whether people who backed the game on PayPal after the end of its Kickstarter should receive the same backer rewards as those who pledged via the crowdfunding site.

It had previously promised that rewards would remain Kickstarter exclusive. At the same time, why punish late backers? Which all seems fair enough.

In the end over 15k backers responded to the poll. 4,009 (26.5%) voted to maintain the Kickstarter exclusivity. 4,670 (30.9%) voted to extend the rewards to PayPal. 6,432 (42.6%) said that they didn’t mind either way.

A Twitter poll came out even stronger in favour of the PayPal extension, with 67 per cent voting in favour, 17 per cent against and 16 per cent not fussed.

All of which sounds like the green light for PayPal rewards, right?

Wrong. This is how Ys interpreted those results: Considering the strong response from those of you who felt that the Exclusive Rewards should remain exclusive for the Kickstarter, those Exclusive Rewards will not be made available on the PayPal page as originally promised.”

As you might imagine, the reaction has been pointed, with many outraged by the bizarre interpretation of the results and equally as many infuriated that people would dare question the mighty Ys.