Sportsfriends Kickstarter goes to the wire

Sportsfriends, the indie e-sports bundle including IGF Nuovo award winner Johan Sebastian Joust, has only 12 hours left to raise an additional $5,000 on Kickstarter.

In what has been a disappointing few weeks for fans of the crowdfunding craze, several campaigns have made headlines with high-profile failures.

The Kung-Fu Superstar campaign sought to revolutionise motion control and fighting games, but instead demonstrated what its lead developer termed the "hatred" for motion control.

Alpha Colony fell short by only $28 dollars, though it was later revealed the developers thought this was probably for the best.

While the Sportsfriends bundle includes many darlings of the indie game community, it has had trouble getting the sort of momentum that has carried other projects on to fame and funding.

It’s tough to say what the problem is, but the public is growing increasingly skeptical of Kickstarter, which has proven to be more a market for established industry figures than the avante-garde innovation so many hope for.

While JS Joust won a great deal of attention for its no-screen "playground game" take on motion control, the campaign may be struggling due to the inital pitch being a bit vague about target platforms.

It also can’t be overlooked that playing Joust could be pricey; each of the required PS Move controllers runs nearly $50 US new, and the game is usually demoed with six or seven controllers.

Whatever the reason the campaign is over $5,000 short of its $150,000 goal, which raises some real questions about the public’s willingness to risk their cash on such experimental titles.