Video games had a successful year on Kickstarter in 2021, new data shows, with a record total of 441 games hitting their funding goals. The data comes from Ico Partners, as reported by GamesIndustry.biz, which pointed out that this record has now been broken two years in a row.
The number of video games successfully funded on Kickstarter has only topped 400 two other times–first in 2014, when 413 games were funded, and then in 2020 with 429 successful projects.
While 2021 was a record-breaking year in terms of the number of projects successfully funded, it saw a small drop in the overall amount of funds raised for video games, from $26 million in 2020 to $24 million in 2021. Neither comes close to video games’ highest-earning year on Kickstarter, which saw a total of $56 million raised across 395 projects back in 2013. Those numbers were helped along by a number of high-profile projects including Torment: Tides of Numenera and Mighty No. 9.
Tabletop games, which tend to be more popular (or at least more common) on Kickstarter than video games by an order of magnitude, also had a successful 2021, beating the previous year in terms of both projects funded and funds raised.
The popular crowdfunding platform may be in for a slower 2022, after an announcement that it would be pivoting to the blockchain caused backlash from both creators and backers. While Kickstarter has since slowed down its transition to the blockchain, it hasn’t cancelled it, leading many creators to look for alternatives in the crowdfunding space.
