Moon Beast Productions launched their demo of its Darkhaven OARPG on Steam (which as of this posting, I have yet to try). As noted before, this is the game/game studio that was formed by former Blizzard North leads/designers.
Part of this technical pre-alpha is associated with their $500,000 Kickstarter (I’ve already stated my opinion on gaming Kickstarter’s). The majority of my ire has been in the MMORPG crowdfunding space, but it also applies to a lot of these other unknown devs overpromising the “moon” (pun intended). While Moon Beast Productions falls outside of this “unknown dev” definition to a degree due to the principals involved, that doesn’t mean this game will turn out to be successful either.
This Kickstarter is an all or nothing goal to fund it to an early access launch (and will probably be easily reached by that March 20, 2026 deadline1). This demo is naturally meant to give players and potential funders an idea of what they’ve been working on since the studio launched in 2021. It’s also risky to allow such an early pre-alpha state version to be this hands on (because gamers have a way of forgetting that).
With this studio having some known industry veterans, does that reputation give them extra “brownie” points? I suppose it does lend a bit more credibility, but I still advise throwing caution to the wind (due diligence) because as I posted about before, none of that means they or this game will end up being good/successful (Torchlight Frontiers, Echtra Games and Max Schaefer being a perfect example).
I do believe that this name recognition (especially Erich Schaefer who is the brother of Blizzard North co-founder, Max Schaefer) does help with the ARPG niche credibility though. I plan on trying to find out why they decided to fund it this way even if I can guess some of the reasons (like how the venture capital for certain niches has been drying up in recent years). Plus there has been all of this game industry fallout in recent years (stop killing games did help make players think a bit more about how awful these gaming industry executives are with their takes on monetization).
But it still does make me wonder given all of their collective experience, connections and industry contacts, how they weren’t able to secure more traditional funding (outside the original infusion of $4.5 million in seed funding for the studio/early prototype work). I realize they may not have entertained some offers (in order to maintain control of their overall vision). This is still one of those questions however which can provide more clarity on “why Kickstarter?”
Furthermore, the timing couldn’t have been worse (with the whole Ashes of Creation drama). But I get the logistics of the Kickstarter AND Steam demo being scheduled well in advance. Myself, I’m looking at this in a more compartmentalized way (the principals involved and their legacy in being part of one of the genre defining games). But as I mentioned before, that was also a function of time and place (a total team effort of the Blizzard Entertainment that existed at that time 25+ years ago).
As for the amount they are looking to raise (to carry things through to an early access launch); while this isn’t a full blown MMO, some of the persistent world features, fully destructible environments, unique biomes, and player driven environmental changes are designs within that same scope. That takes resources (the correct design experience and therefore, money).
We know the expectation for great gameplay and content is going to be on the high side (because of the Blizzard North/Diablo II tie-in’s of this studio; I just have a hard time seeing how even a stretch goal of $1.5 million will be enough to create an early access title that doesn’t feel just ok where players are writing “needs more work and has potential” (NOTE: up until the “update”, this was being written without having tried the alpha yet because I wanted to put these thoughts down first without that demo affecting my base gut feelings).
The FAQ (for the Kickstarter) answers a few questions (some key points: the plan is for it to be buy-to-play and they believe an offline mode is going to be important for the game; the demo provides a single player offline mode).
UPDATE: I started playing the tech demo (single player). For the most part, it is standard ARPG fare in terms of the combat and game play loop, but also has some added mechanics; the jump being one of them (to get out of crowd control situations, to jump over mobs as part of the combat, or to utilize the environment to jump up/over obstacles, to build/create blocks/walls from certain parts of the game world). The dynamically changing world itself is definitely interesting.
For a tech alpha demo, the current artwork and general combat/movement are ok/nothing to say wow about. It does have WASD movement and as the devs stated, the game doesn’t really have the usual pre-defined pathing that an isometric camera style game normally has (the broader freedom of movement feels good; a Mythos style ability to unlock the camera into an actual 3rd person view would be icing on the cake (some of them worked on that MMO after leaving Blizzard North to form Flagship Studio). It’s definitely barebones and rough (no surprise given its very early state) but shows promising potential.
I only hit level 4 (can’t progress past level 8) on my initial limited play (and will continue until I’ve played through what the demo offers (and then maybe try the online part). The slow leveling is meant to extend the game play given the limited demo. The loot was alright but I guess I need to hit a few more levels (unlocking more of the available skill tree and getting good items) to get a better feel for how they impact my character. They only have one class available (witch) at this time and noted they are still working on the class skill tree.
While not the fault of this demo, what’s clear is that ARPG’s have lost their appeal for me. I guess I should be even more specific; gaming in general has remained off my radar (especially after June 2024 when ArcheAge shutdown) except occasionally jumping back into these locally self-run ArcheAge emulators and less so, my TERA offline setups).
Which leads me back to whether or not their Kickstarter (even if it meets the $1.5 million stretch goal), will be sufficient for building out the game into something that would be more impactful for its early access launch (in order to draw in more players for the actual buy to play launch). I do realize the bulk of their initial seed funding probably went into creating the backend foundation (the unsexy but really important stuff if the intention is to build something great on top). Or maybe I’m just used to the cash burn rate for building out an MMO.
Judging from their FAQ, they seem confident about the capabilities they in that backend foundation to add on the features and systems that they want to (including the modding and marketplace options for that). But I guess we will need to see it in action when those systems are roughly implemented.
UPDATE: their Kickstarter has definitely slowed down after the initial day 1 hype (I initially thought they’d clear $150K in the first day). While there are still 29 days left (as of this update), this decreasing pace will not cut it. The supporter rewards are kind of underwhelming and I also understand they don’t want to push a lot of physical merchandise (because that has its own logistical challenges to create and deliver).
Releasing the demo may not have helped; as I noted, it has potential, but I don’t see how this Kickstarter amount (if they reach it) will make a huge impact for early access. If I were to put on the venture capitalist cap, a question I’d be asking is what level of funding being requested, and asking for a theoretical breakdown of how much and where it would be going into (just to hear what the priorities and how they qualify it).
I also believe that constantly associating yourself with this past legacy, is a double-edge sword (because it sets these often times, unrealistic expectations). It’s always been a larger team effort plus the before mentioned time/place of the game industry in those years, the demographic of the players, and the tech available then.
Expectations themselves are different today plus former ARPG enjoyers like myself, have moved on from the genre. The one thing I left out in my short review was how no part of the demo felt fun (a small part of any demo no matter how low the expecations, should be able to convey that). Then after the single player offline game play became severely FPS laggy (as the Necropolis event continued consuming more areas), I stopped playing (only managed to hit level 5). No reason to play a slideshow (I know optimization isn’t great given this is only a very early rough demo).
The take away is that I know some of these first impressions, are going to be lasting ones for some folks. This means the team has to figure out how to motivate the ones sitting on the fence and/or those learning about this, to fund this to its goal or figure out other ways to drum up some new level of excitement. I know overhyping something like a Kickstarter is another issue. But the initial anticipation has passed and the technical demo itself is what it is (lacking any serious wow factor).
What is also not known is what they will do if the goal isn’t met. As it currently stands, I don’t see anything they can do to generate reasonable interest without any pitch coming across as forced. And I doubt their initial plans included putting out an updated demo build to address issues highlighted. I’m thinking that if they don’t meet the goal, they will have to regroup, go through all of the feedback, and maybe reset their funding goals and timeline.
- the first day, over $100,000 was raised but the last 2 days, it has clearly slowed down (the technical pre-alpha demo and a lot more now being wary of gaming Kickstarters after Ashes of Creation, are definitely weighing on this campaign (the comments also show some cancelled pledges). ↩︎
