Chris Roberts reveals secret to Star Citizen’s crowdfunding success

The man behind the one of the most successful crowdfunding games of all time has discussed the secret behind Star Citizen’s impressive total.

The trick, he says, is to never stop crowdfunding.

“The big thing is the thing that we didn’t do,” he told Wired. “Most crowdfunding campaigns engage some people, convince them to become backers, and the the campaign stops. We didn’t stop.”

The result of not stopping is a total of $77m from backers – a figure that keeps on raising.

The amount of money raised is constantly tracked on the Cloud Imperium website, along with information on the stretch goals the developer kept adding.

“We’ve talked about taking [the counter] down,” said the studio’s director of communications David Swofford. “But we asked the fans, and they like seeing that number.”

Star Citizen was originally due in November 2014, but Cloud Imperium has used the increased funds to add more and more features, with the game currently expected to launch towards the end of the year.

Wired observes that some backers are complaining that the developers are spending too long on unnecessary extras.

A gamer known as Wulf Knight – one of the game’s biggest supporters – told the site: “Some people think, ‘I put a hundred bucks into this game and you owe me this and this and this’. No. Your $100 entitles you to just as much as my 22 grand does, which is zero. You gave them money to make this game. You’re not buying anything; it’s a donation.”