Critical Role Critical Role's Kickstarter Breaks $1,000,000 In About An Hour!

For those hoping for a new D&D cartoon, Critical Role has just launched a Kickstarter for an animated show based on their livestream campaign. It broke a million dollars in about an hour, and has 45 days left to go...

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"Critical Role's The Legend of Vox Machina reunites your favorite D&D heroes for a professional-quality animated special!"

Also on offer are theme song MP3s, production art prints, sticker sets, dice, playing card sets, plushies, pin sets, canvas bags, and more.

 

[Iry]

I love every part of this except the faces.
Does anyone else think the character faces are a little empty? Like they could use slightly more detail?

 

[Ash Mantle]

I'm going to go ahead and sound like the sour old bastard I am here. Basically, the "news" here is that some rich and famous people just got substantially richer, and will become even more famous.

Whenever I hear a news headline that amounts to "stupendously popular thing gets a million dollars in less than an hour" my thought is almost always "why am I supposed to be happy about that?".

They got rich and famous in the first place for...streaming themselves playing D&D while being voice actors? Meh. I don't feel like I'm going out a limb when I say I've played better D&D with better D&D players. As a matter of fact, a couple of them were probably better voice actors, too, in spite of that not being their vocation. Is this supposed to be some kind of triumph for the game of D&D or the gaming hobby? Again...meh. What I care about is actually playing D&D. When I walk into a game store and there are eight tables with eight DMs packed with eight or more people each, that's what I care about, and 5th Edition has already done that. I don't think this is going to grow D&D. I think it's going to grow the ranks of non-gamers who lurk on the periphery of the hobby now that it has some social cache, watching streams or whatever.

Are we excited because a D&D related thing is going to maybe be the biggest Kickstarter ever? I guess that I can see being exciting at least a little bit. It's still an obscene amount of money that would help society more if it were put anywhere else, with the exceptions of professional sports and various political lobbies.

I'm just jealous of Critical Role? OBVIOUSLY I'm jealous of Critical Role. Did you read the topic title? They made A MILLION ACTUAL DOLLARS IN AN HOUR. If you're not jealous of that, I think you're probably certifiable.

So they're going to make a D&D cartoon? Again...meh. I'm not 12. That's money that could go towards real things where it's far more sorely needed if nerds weren't throwing it at other nerds to make nerd stuff. There are exceptions, I will admit. If something that I have been a rabid fan of for years is also something I've perceived as a genuine underdog, or underappreciated, then I will climb on the hype train and toot the horn as loudly as possible. The first and last example of that I can think of, off the top of my head, is Delta Green.

Okay, let me also throw in a "bah, humbug!" for good measure and I'm done grinching for the moment. Don't even bother responding to this post. Scrooge McDuck will remove himself from the premises and you can resume your jubilation and fiscal speculation.

You should feel free to express what you think.

I'm not invested in Critical Role as a whole, this KS or its outcome but I've watched some of Critical Role and a lot of other streamers and found them consistently entertaining, and layered with emotional depth and investment, and character growth and development.

I feel that just saying they got rich and famous for only streaming themselves playing D&D is a little unfair, yes, when it comes down to it, they're only streaming themselves playing D&D but they're also working hard to bring entertainment, joy and happiness into people's lives. I think this can't be understated. Anecdotally, I've heard that just watching or listening to streamed games or podcasts can help people, whether through bringing them joy and happiness, or bringing them out of a dark spot, or anything in between. Chris Perkins has mentioned this before, and he said he had a responsibility to get out there to bring joy and happiness to the audience in spite of his own personal anxieties (whether other people share this lofty goal is uncertain, but it's a hope).

It's also not like every single drop of that money is only going to the Critical Role crew, making a television series, even a cartoon series, costs a lot of money, and they've mentioned fulfilling their obligations. I also feel that so many people invested in this passion project is also good for our hobby. Streams such these do bring greater visibility to D&D and 5e, and may even help bring audience participation to other passion projects, may bring back some of the older players who left the hobby for a time, and may introduce new gamers to the hobby.

 

[Storyteller Hero]

Oh wow with 42 days left, it's at over $6.3 million with over 46 thousand backers.

Episodes 1 & 2: A brand new story centered around Vox Machina at level 7 (FUNDED!)

Episodes 3, 4, 5, 6: Briarwoods arc! (FUNDED!)

Episodes 7 & 8: Continuation of Briarwoods arc (Stretch goal: $7.5M)

Episodes 9 & 10: Continuation and conclusion of Briarwoods arc


This kickstarter is hitting those stretch goals like a boss monster!

 

[Reynard]

I'm going to go ahead and sound like the sour old bastard I am here. Basically, the "news" here is that some rich and famous people just got substantially richer, and will become even more famous.

I think you might be overestimating how rich and famous these people were prior to starting Critical Role. I mean, they signed up to play D&D on Twitch. How freaking "rich and famous" could they have been if that was their plan to make it big? They were (and are) hard working folks that happened into a thing that found a dedicated audience. How can anyone be mad about that?

Note: I don't even watch CR. I'm not some white knighting fanboy. But devaluing creative people's work out of what, jealousy?, kind of irritates me.

 

[SkidAce]

I'm going to go ahead and sound like the sour old bastard I am here. Basically, the "news" here is that some rich and famous people just got substantially richer, and will become even more famous.

They also got famous and gained traction for donating money from the beginning of the show to 826LA and other charities.

Its not as shallow as you seem to think.

A lot of people can identify with them, some of the stupid game mistakes and lousy jokes they make are the same ones I've seen since the 80s.

I like them, they remind me of real people playing the same game I do.

 

[Jester David]

What would be 10% of Critical Role's followers? 100,000?

They have 1.9 million followers on YouTube alone. And likely more on Twitch. So maybe 200,000 or more.

 

[jmucchiello]

I'm going to go ahead and sound like the sour old bastard I am here. Basically, the "news" here is that some rich and famous people just got substantially richer, and will become even more famous.

I was going to rebuke this but it's a joke, right? Right? Rebuking it is just going to result is a loud whooshing sound going over my head, right?

Well played.

 

[CleverNickName]

Don't look now, but in just three days, this is already the 12th highest-funded project in Kickstarter history...it'll probably be the 10th by the time I get up for work tomorrow morning.

 

[André Soares]

I'm going to go ahead and sound like the sour old bastard I am here. Basically, the "news" here is that some rich and famous people just got substantially richer, and will become even more famous.

Whenever I hear a news headline that amounts to "stupendously popular thing gets a million dollars in less than an hour" my thought is almost always "why am I supposed to be happy about that?".

They got rich and famous in the first place for...streaming themselves playing D&D while being voice actors? Meh. I don't feel like I'm going out a limb when I say I've played better D&D with better D&D players. As a matter of fact, a couple of them were probably better voice actors, too, in spite of that not being their vocation. Is this supposed to be some kind of triumph for the game of D&D or the gaming hobby? Again...meh. What I care about is actually playing D&D. When I walk into a game store and there are eight tables with eight DMs packed with eight or more people each, that's what I care about, and 5th Edition has already done that. I don't think this is going to grow D&D. I think it's going to grow the ranks of non-gamers who lurk on the periphery of the hobby now that it has some social cache, watching streams or whatever.

Are we excited because a D&D related thing is going to maybe be the biggest Kickstarter ever? I guess that I can see being exciting at least a little bit. It's still an obscene amount of money that would help society more if it were put anywhere else, with the exceptions of professional sports and various political lobbies.

I'm just jealous of Critical Role? OBVIOUSLY I'm jealous of Critical Role. Did you read the topic title? They made A MILLION ACTUAL DOLLARS IN AN HOUR. If you're not jealous of that, I think you're probably certifiable.

So they're going to make a D&D cartoon? Again...meh. I'm not 12. That's money that could go towards real things where it's far more sorely needed if nerds weren't throwing it at other nerds to make nerd stuff. There are exceptions, I will admit. If something that I have been a rabid fan of for years is also something I've perceived as a genuine underdog, or underappreciated, then I will climb on the hype train and toot the horn as loudly as possible. The first and last example of that I can think of, off the top of my head, is Delta Green.

Okay, let me also throw in a "bah, humbug!" for good measure and I'm done grinching for the moment. Don't even bother responding to this post. Scrooge McDuck will remove himself from the premises and you can resume your jubilation and fiscal speculation.

You must be fun at parties....

Gatekeeping, talking about "I play better D&D", cartoons being for 12 year olds, all the greatest hits of toxic people in this hobby.

 

[jmucchiello]

How many backers do you think this kickstarter will get? Most kickstarter backers was a game with 107,000.

Depends on how much of boost the actual game stream starting in 10 minutes gives, I think. It's certainly possible. But that more than double the current number of backers.

There was not a big surge last night. So I doubt the number of backers will more than double by the end of the kickstarter. As I write this they are just under 47,000 backers. (And $6.4m)