TL;DR - Mike is changing A LOT of what originally made the project seeming appealing, I expressed my concern but said I would "patiently wait to see what the new path was", and he banned me. Take from this what you want, but he still hasn't replied to my refund request (e-mail and Twitter).
Perhaps I'm over-reacting, but seeing as how I backed this project and have now been banned from the ONLY source of updates...and still no reply to my refund request, this has turned into quite the nightmare. Hopefully others don't have to go through this mess.
So today I was banned from the Soul Saga (DisasterCake) forum;
http://forums.disastercake.com/
This came as a surprise since I'm generally a quiet and fair member. I'm a moderator for a few sites, a respected member on countless others, and yet today sees me banned for the first time in as long as I can remember.
Why was I banned? Well it all started when Mike Gale launched a Kickstarter campaign called "Soul Saga: Episode 1". Based on the original KS campaign, the art was very "chibi", similar to Final Fantasy 3 and 4 on the PSP, Bravely Default on the 3DS, etc. This IMMEDIATELY drew me in as I loved those first two games and cannot wait to play Bravely Default. The gameplay in Soul Saga was going to be similar to FFX and other JRPG's according to the campaign page;
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/disastercake/soul-saga-a-j-rpg-inspired-by-playstation-classics
If you compare the art and gameplay, to what was recently posted in the Developer Diaries on the forum (and then restricted to members who would be "respectful" -- his words --), it sounds like things are changing considerably. Here's a comparison of the original art (during the KS campaign) and the two redesigns (AFTER the campaign closed);
Couple these drastic art style changes with recent posts from Mike Gale (campaign creator, man behind DisasterCake) stating "major" changes were coming and that he was going to need to reduce the scope of the project, and it's only natural some people would begin to question what they backed/invested in.
And that brings me to my current issue. As an investor in this project, I outlined, constructively (see below), my issues with the changes up to this point. I clearly stated that;
- Art changed (see above), "chibi" style REALLY sold me, was disappointed to see that change AFTER the campaign ended.
- Mike (creator) keeps going through artists like they're water...very concerning.
- Game appears to be turning into a Final Fantasy 7 clone, which we have plenty of, definitely NOT why I backed this project.
- About 2-3 days ago Mike posted on the Dev Diaries section (when it was still public) that after re-evaluating things, he was going to have to make some "MAJOR" changes and go down a "different path" and "reduce the scope" of the project...uh oh.
When I brought up my concerns (in an constructive but HONEST way) about all of these changes on the forum, Mike immediately attacked me and said I wasn't being respectful, that "threatening" to request a refund only hurts others who supported the project, that if I want "sunshine and roses" I should avoid the developer diaries...
Well, after seeing that this morning I immediately posted, requesting a refund. I was still trying to remain calm and collected in my posts and advised him that locking the dev diaries to "only respectful members" was essentially running and hiding what he was doing, AND terrible business sense.
Then I was banned.
Needless-to-say, I'm no longer interested in this project. I'll turn the first post into a wiki for others to edit if necessary...