An idea for crowdfunding new building artwork for user-created MODs

[David]

The idea:
Use the crowdfunding model to provide funding for outsourcing productions of new building models for user-created MODs. (e.g. Make a better looking gas station for the Real World MOD.)

How the crowdfunding might work:
-Set up a special purchase link for Capitalism Lab. Users who want to donate may buy the Capitalism Lab game for a second time ($19.99 base game and all the bundle versions will be available). You may give away the purchased Capitalism Lab keys to your friends or resell it on game resale web sites, if you want. (For details about our policies of allowing users to resell CapLab keys, please see the relevant info on this page: https://www.capitalismlab.com/resell_caplab_keys/)

-A 9% transaction fee is deducted from the purchase price as it is charged by FastSpring.

-The cost of a new 3D building model from an outsourcing company range from US$200 to $700, depending on the size, complexity and quality. If you are an artist or you know of any capable artwork outsourcing firm, please feel free to recommend them to me. You may either post here or PM me.

-We will tally the sales generated from these purchase links and post the latest sales amount every 1-2 months.

-We will provide details as to how we use the fund for artwork outsourcing, including the artwork outsourcing company we used and the actual costs we paid for the artwork.

-The resulting buildings will be released to the community. Any modders may use the buildings in their mods.

A bonus to the contributors:
-Once you have made a contribution via this crowdfunding, you will be given the rights to use any of the 3D models created using the entire fund. Let's say that there are ten 3D models created in total so far and you have made a contribution of $19.99, you will be given the rights to use any of the ten 3D models in your own projects, web sites or games, so long as you do not resell them. So this can be a very good deal for anyone who finds the artwork of some use.

If you have any suggestions, please feel free to post here.

When the poll has gathered at least 10 positive votes, we will put this into action and set up the aforementioned special purchase links.

For those of you who support this, please post your forum name on this thread. We will email you once this idea has gathered enough interest from the community and eventually materialized.

[David]

Alternatively, we could buy 3D models from off the shelf 3D asset providers like this one:
https://www.cgtrader.com/3d-models/exte ... e/city-kc6

The cost will be lower, but we will license the right to use existing models, instead of owning the copyright of newly made models.

Once we have enough positive votes (10 votes), we will set up another poll seeking users' feedback on which buildings and what sources they would prefer.

[KCtrackhawk]

Can we try and raise 750-1000 for a 4x4 / 5x5 mixed use building!? Department store, commercial, and residential in one!? When you click on would just open all 3 windows... would be cool cause could make RE speculation / development more effective but that one building could be epicly expensive to “fill”

[baz]

I'm kind of mixed regarding this idea. As i'm not a modder I don't really require different or newer buildings but for eye candy in the game then they do look much better. If you currently have artists or at least use them, why not get them to sit down and create a post on how to create the content and then see if the users on this website can then create the new content. You may find that someone here does have the art side but doesn't have the current ability to use that on computers, if that makes sense. I would love to see how it's done and I would give it a try but i'm not an artist in any shape. Interestingly I'm currently working with 3D scanning for my own business trying to create content and it is difficult as so many things can be copyrighted without you knowing, even buildings. Looking at the website they do work in the same format as i'm working on. Very interesting. I use various 3D equipment and can capture a car to much smaller objects. I've recently stared looking into topology graphics for cities, using google and turning the topology into a 3d model. In theory I can capture a large piece of a city and turn it into a 3d model. This was only research as part of a wider thing for me to look into but I could capture individual buildings, almost any in London for example. Would that work or is there copy write issues in that?
Are you only interested in fresh content or content based on current buildings?

I'm assuming that you either own the copy write content, then can allow others to use it as much as they want or you have to purchase it then get charged every time you use the content?
I do understand that the new graphics need to be funded. My personal opinion about crowd sourcing is it would work better for Cap 3, as a you would have your current users, keen to see the latest game and secondly you use crowdfunding site to encourage others to get involved. Whilst this content is very specific to this game so it won't pull in new users on it's own. Perhaps as a community we need to sit down and discuss the road map going forward and our ambitions and understand the financial model to support it.
I'm always asking you guys to do this that and the other and i'm happy to pay but I prefer them as DLC's, as it really adds something to the game, whilst graphic are only eye candy.
Firaxis for me are terrible at that, create a new civ game but really it was improved graphics some new features but lots of features removed and then used DLC's to add the same things back.

What about if you created a new updated content pack, that improved all of the buildings, You could poll to see if anyone would be willing, and getting enough votes should determine whether you would raise the necessary cash to cover the cost? I'm assuming $2000- $3000 would cover it, 600 users at $5 a pop.
The fear I have With the crowdfunding model, you would have to wait for the cash before you start and you could find that you don't reach the number delaying the project, whilst the crowd funders themselves are in limbo.

[David]

Thanks for your inputs. Currently our objective is mainly to assist the modders to acquire new buildings of higher graphics quality and made them freely available to the community using the crowdfunding model.

FYI, as mentioned in the original post, the cost of a single new 3D building model from an outsourcing company range from US$200 to $700. CapLab base game has over a hundred buildings and structures. Thus this cost of revamping all the graphics will be too high. Instead, we will be using internal resources to produce new versions of the base game buildings gradually over time (for example the Computer Store.)

I hope that more users will be willing to participate in this poll for the goal of helping to improve the user-created mods which are really excellent in creativity and quality, but a bit lacking in the new buildings' looks.

[David]

We may be able to find freelancers who can create building artwork for mods from www.fiverr.com at lower costs (around $300-$500 perhaps)

We are thinking about setting up a www.patreon.com account for this, for users who like this idea to donate as little as $1 per month for this purposes.

Enlight will match the donation in the same amount for 2 years since the setup of such a patreon account. For example, if there is a total donation of $50 per month from 50 people, Enlight will contribute an additional $50 per month, for a total of $100. In 3 to 5 months, the accumulated fund will be $300-$500, sufficient for paying a freelance to create a piece of new artwork for a building in a mod.

For as little as $1 per month, the whole community will benefit from having a constant stream of new artwork.

What do you think? Would you guys be interested?

[jondonnis]

Not sure if there is enough active people on the forums to do this. And running this over 2 years? Seems quite long unless of course the artwork is trickled out. What if one half decided they aren't interested and then another half are? Would this then rule out the half that aren't interested in paying anything from every using the RealWorld MOD again because it now has the "Latest artwork patch required" which you'd have to pay for?

[David]

Not sure if there is enough active people on the forums to do this. And running this over 2 years? Seems quite long unless of course the artwork is trickled out. What if one half decided they aren't interested and then another half are? Would this then rule out the half that aren't interested in paying anything from every using the RealWorld MOD again because it now has the "Latest artwork patch required" which you'd have to pay for?

You have brought up some valid points. Perhaps patreon.com is not an ideal solution. Our aim is to gather resources from people who are willing to contribute and provide the resources to modders for enriching their mods. If you have any suggestions as to now this can be put into practice without potential downsides, please let me know.

[jondonnis]

One possible way might be to reach out to Uni's. As Capitalism 2 was well known to be used in universities for teaching people the business side of the world, maybe you could throw it out there. If students want to donate their spare time to make at least one building, then could then use that work and project as part of their course project.

Before finishing this post I just asked my nephew if he'd be interested. Lives on the Isle of Wight in the UK. He said yes, he's at college and would use it for his portfolio for uni. He;s never seen the game before so I've sent him a link. Let me know if you're interested in contacting him and I PM you his e-mail address. He's currently doing an animation course at college.

[David]

Before finishing this post I just asked my nephew if he'd be interested. Lives on the Isle of Wight in the UK. He said yes, he's at college and would use it for his portfolio for uni. He;s never seen the game before so I've sent him a link. Let me know if you're interested in contacting him and I PM you his e-mail address. He's currently doing an animation course at college.

Thanks. Let's first see if he is interested in the game. If so, I would be happy to send him a free key of Capitalism Lab so that he can try it out. If he likes the game after playing it, then we can discuss further.