Fig (company)

Fig

Type of site	Crowdfunding
Headquarters	San Francisco, California, U.S.
Founder(s)	Justin Bailey Bob Ippolito Freeman White
Key people	Aaron Isaksen Brian Fargo Feargus Urquhart Tim Schafer Alex Rigopulos Cliff Bleszinski
Website	www.fig.co
Launched	August 18, 2015

Fig is a crowdfunding platform for video games. The crowdfunding platform was founded by Justin Bailey (formerly, COO of Double Fine Productions),^[1] Bob Ippolito, and Freeman White. The advisory board is composed of executives from across the video game industry with previous experience in crowdfunding and investing in video game projects: Aaron Isaksen of the Indie Fund, Brian Fargo of inXile Entertainment, Feargus Urquhart of Obsidian Entertainment, and Tim Schafer of Double Fine Productions. The platform is backed by funding from Spark Capital.^[2] Both Alex Rigopulos, from Harmonix, and Cliff Bleszinski, formerly of Epic Games and currently of Boss Key Productions, have since joined the advisory board of Fig.^[3][4]

Approach

Fig is offered as an alternative means for funding video game development from traditional crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter. The goal of Fig is to allow not only the traditional backing of a video game as with normal crowdfunding, but to also enable those that can invest in a game's development to receive a portion of the game's profits once it is released, in addition to other typical rewards that crowdfunded projects allow.^[2] During their initial growth period, Fig limited investors in such projects to those that have accredited assets of over $1 million, with plans that once off the ground, anyone will be able to contribute and invest in their offered projects.^[2]

Due to the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act which changed how the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) treated crowdfunding, Fig will allow anyone to invest at a minimum of $1,000 into future campaigns starting in December 2015.^[5] However, there were initially some issues with gaining SEC approval to collect funds from unaccredited investors, holding up the funding for some of the campaigns after this point such as Psychonauts 2, and Fig has been supplying the requested funds to developers through internal support and investment.^[6][7] In September 2016, the SEC approved Fig's plan allowing unaccredited investors to purchase Fig Game Shares once campaigns have succeeded.^[8] While future campaigns will also require their SEC review for unaccredited investors, work for establishing the mechanism for the Psychonauts 2 campaign by Fig and its legal firm should streamline these subsequent reviews. Fig had adapted a plan to account for unaccredited investors that may opt to not providing the funding during the course of a SEC review; Fig will still provide the full amount of money committed at the time of the campaign to the developers, and will hold any unpaid unaccrediated share for sale that others can subsequently purchase as to otherwise keep the same percentages of equity between accredited and unaccredited shareholders.^[9]

The concept for allowing investments of this nature resulted from the advisory board members' previous experience with Kickstarter campaigns, in which those that backed at the largest amounts typically were the least disruptive of the development process as they likely had the most trust in the game developer to complete the title as offered, according to Bailey.^[2] They also took inspiration from the success of Oculus VR, the company formed to develop their Oculus Rift virtual reality hardware through a $2.5 million Kickstarter campaign and eventually was sold to Facebook for $2 billion. Bailey believes that the most invested fans of such projects should be able to have a portion of those profits for a highly successful title.^[10]

Because Fig uses both traditional backing as well as investment support, potential investors will be able to judge on a project's viability based on how many backers the project has accrued, which can help derisk their investment.^[10] According to Schafer, he hopes that this will create a reputation for games that would fall somewhere between AAA titles and indie games, allowing for smaller teams to develop games with larger budgets (on the order of millions of dollars) that normally require large publication deals.^[2] Schafer also felt that with average crowd-funding projects typically seeking funds via Kickstarter, there is a growing fatigue in the area, where only certain niche projects, such as "Exploding Kittens", gain attention, and considered Fig a means to counter that fatigue for games that did not fit those niches.^[1]

Fig's approach is designed to support only one or two campaigns at a time, in contrast to the volume that are offered by Kickstarter or other crowdfunding services. Projects will be curated by Fig for viability and interest before they are supported,^[2] and will allow them to customize the website's project page for the game title to enhance its appeal.^[10] Fig may expand to have more concurrent projects if the platform proves successful.^[10] Fig will not require projects to accept investment support as long they offer typical backing options.^[10] As part of their support, Fargo, Urquhart, and Schafer have said that all future games developed by their respective studios will use Fig-based funding.^[2]

The name "Fig" derives from Hotel Figueroa, located along Figueroa Street a short distance from the Los Angeles Convention Center where the annual Electronic Entertainment Expo is traditionally held; Hotel Figueroa became a common social hub during these E3 events.^[2]

Games funded

The first game to be funded on Fig is Outer Wilds, originally by Team Outer Wilds but now under actor Masi Oka's studio Mobius Digital, in which the members of Team Outer Wilds were employed into after Oka saw the game and was encouraged to support their development.^[2] Oka was impressed by the options Fig offered for managing the project as well as the reputation and clout of the advisory board to use the platform to support the game.^[2] The Outer Wilds campaign sought $125,000 of total funding with $50,000 of that being from investors, but within the first few days of its launch, Fig was inundated with a large amount of investment interest; Mobius agreed to increase the investment amount to $75,000, requiring them to turn away nearly $800,000 of potential investment from 80 different investors.^[11]

5th Cell had committed to using Fig for their next project, Anchors in the Drift, a free-to-play role-playing game; 5th Cell was seeking $500,000 in investment and funding to finish off the game.^[12][13] The funding drive failed to meet its goal, only obtaining just above $100,000 of funding. Bailey stated that while they had anticipated a larger response based on the success of the Outer Wilds campaign, the failure demonstrates the nature of the crowdfunding where developers have a better gauge of player interest based on the success or failures of such campaigns.^[14]

In December 2015, Schafer announced Psychonauts 2, the sequel to Double Fine's Psychonauts, would be the next game to be funded through Fig, with a goal of $3.3 million of funding and investment.^[15] The campaign successfully completed with over $3.8 million raised from over 24,000 backers, with nearly half coming from investment-type funding as opposed to traditional reward-based backers.^[16]

Funding for Interabang's Jay and Silent Bob: Chronic Blunt Punch, a Castle Crashers-style brawler game based on the characters created by Kevin Smith, was announced in February 2016. The developers sought $400k in funding for the title.^[17] The campaign was successfully funded with over $435,000 from backers.^[18]

On Alex Rigopolis's joining of Fig's advisory board, he stated that he planned to use Fig to finance a future Harmonix product. Harmonix launched a campaign on Fig in March 2016 to port Rock Band 4 to the personal computer, seeking $1.5 million in funding to complete the port.^[19] The campaign only met about 50% of its funding goal, though Harmonix has not ruled out other means to bring Rock Band 4 to the PC.^[20]

Interdimensional Games used Fig to fund a sequel to Consortium, entitled Consortium: The Tower. Interdimensional Games had first tried to fund the project through Kickstarter in early 2016, but only raised about CAD $182,000 of the $450,000 they targeted. The developers saw that the Kickstarter would likely fail early on, and starting planning on using Fig as a backup plan. The Fig campaign launched in April 2016, seeking to raise USD$300,000 (about the same as the Kickstarter), and has surpassed this amount.^[21]

inXile Entertainment will use Fig to launch crowdfunding for Wasteland 3, the sequel to its 2014 Wasteland 2. The campaign, to start in October 2016, seeks $2.75 million in funding and investment, an amount comparable to what Wasteland 2 had obtained through Kickstarter.^[22]

Make Sail is a survival game set aboard a primarily ocean world, allowing the player to craft and improve a sea-worthy vessel to explore the world. The game is being developed by Popcannibal, who previously created Girls Like Robots and Elegy for a Dead World. The Fig campaign seeks $50,000 in funding.^[23]

References

External links

• Official website