Post news Report RSS Alphafunding for Indie Games

Play your favorite game from alpha to completion and support game developers with Desura's new alphafunding initative.

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The idea behind alphafunding is simple, fans get instant access to their favorite games with the understanding that the game might be buggy and isn't complete - but frequent updates will add polish over time. The developers can then fund the games continued creation, giving supporters early access to the latest and greatest content.

It's win-win

It is essentially crowdfunding (like Kickstarter, Indie Go Go, GamesPlant or 8 bit funding) only with instant rewards for players and developers filling the void between the idea and the pre-order / release phase. Digital distribution is an amazing medium for getting access to content early, so while alphafunding isn't for every game, why wait till release to fund your game, when you have fans wanting to support you every step of the way? It is a model which has worked extremely well for Minecraft, Overgrowth, Natural Selection 2 and others, who have benefited from their fans support from the very beginning.

Launch Titles

Today on Desura we aim to make alphafunding easy and launch with 5 excellent titles, each for different tastes. We've got Project Zomboid a zombie survival game like no other, Survivors of Ragnarok a city crafting game inspired by Dwarf Fortress, King Arthur's Gold a 64 person multiplayer pixel battle royale, Wyv and Keep a puzzle solving classic and Rotion a challenging ambient indie puzzler.


Interested?

There are a lot of risks involved with alphafunding so not every game is eligible... but if you are open about your development, want to give and get support from your fans then get in contact and let us know about your project.

Post comment Comments  (0 - 50 of 57)
Theon
Theon

Yay!
I have supported Minecraft, Overgrowth, Caster, Silas, Survivors of Ragnarok and Crystal Catacombs, and NO REGRETS so far :D

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Hayst
Hayst

and project zomboid?

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Theon
Theon

Nope. For some reason, that game never caught my interest.
Try and convince me, though, and I might give it a chance :]

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pogswarts
pogswarts

Look at the clock, get the demo, look at the clock again.

Did you see how long you played?

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hero1900
hero1900

hehehe sometimes its hard to play game in alpha stage me for instance support it and got it but cant play it since it hangs

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Waddlesticks
Waddlesticks

Project Zombiod is quite creative and is an enjoyable zombie game. It is pretty unique!

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Icetea117
Icetea117

Mate its like the best Zombie survival ever made. You can make fotress, barricade windows, find cool wepons and kill zombies, craft stuff and use tons of supplies to survie. The latest update will involve a bigger map, skills and let u team up with NPC to Defend, Help and Trade. But wait u cant forget the brand new Graphics which will also come out soon in 2.0 :)

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Jamiix03
Jamiix03

If I were you I would download the demo It's a great game once you play it at first you see it and think it doesn't look that great seems okay... but believe me I played it and I find it a great game it's a bit like DayZ just the graphics are different by alot!

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None540
None540

Dayz is a bit like it, PZ came out WAY before dayz :)

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Jpmerida
Jpmerida

Count us too. =)

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Memorix101
Memorix101

I supported Minecraft and Overgrowth :)

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BrainCandy
BrainCandy

Very interesting ! I will send you a mail then !

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Chriz_86
Chriz_86

Great initiative and good use of Desura. I will surely support some games this way over time.

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Tastyrice
Tastyrice

Damn that is a sexy cast of flagship titles if I do say so myself ;)

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Slevo
Slevo

always about the money, what about the dedication and love for doing something? my motivation is people liking and playing my games and returning very nice comments :D

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Theon
Theon

Yes, and this is how we as gamers may return the favour. Yes, Notch has been a lazy pig, and a real moneygrubber, but some people actually need funding to be able to focus on making the game glorious, rather than wasting time in some burger joint :)

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Skylar15
Skylar15

Yes, but if they had no money they cannot develop the game.

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Theon
Theon

Well, that's not necessarily true.
But I still like to show support to my favourite form of entertainment, when people really put effort into making something for us to enjoy :]

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Slevo
Slevo

u can develop the game without money.

So your game is taking too long to develop this makes you get mad because people aren't giving you money yet so you stop developing your game which just justify's the fact your just in it for the money.

programming is something that just requires time (it has nothing to do with money, same with modeling ,animation and art these all don't require money to work on just your own dedication and love)

We are Indie developers for a reason, what we create is better because we do it in our own times with allot more dedication then just a price tag. But that's just me.

Ill never be asking for any money in any projects i work on because the making of the game is as much a reward as the happy people that play it and return good comments (I'm sure allot of indie developers are the same)

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Gibberstein
Gibberstein

You won't get far developing a game without food.

You won't get far developing a game without electricity.

If you're working full-time to pay for the above you don't have much free time - sure it might get finished eventually, but if your players want to see it finished this decade you need a way to pay for food and electricity while also spending lots of time on development. Alpha funding allows this to happen, and I'm proud to be supporting it :)

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ethankaminski
ethankaminski

Yep, it's all about the food, electricity, rent and such. If all these things were free, I'd make games and put 'em up for free - relying solely on things like Flattr for teh monies. However, food and especially rent are *not* free, so if it's a choice between charging for what I create, or being unable to devote enough time to the project, then I'm charging :P.

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iggynore
iggynore

In resume - not all of us live with our parents anymore.

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Washeek
Washeek

You know, stop solving what does not need to be solved. What is so bad on being paid for your hobby? Does not the prospect of recieving money for what you do for fun in your spare time intrigue you? Is it that bad?

And you have to look on a complete different aspect of paying indie devs. It is a means of protest against the big companies and a lot of "not nearly as good and fun to play games as were made before" they produce and demand being paid for.

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CrazyWolfGaming
CrazyWolfGaming

a lot of people do this full time... how do they pay for rent or food? just give them the 1-5$ (average indie game price)

Besides, what would make you entertained longer, a movie for 5$, or a game for 5$?

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Kamikazi[Uk]
Kamikazi[Uk]

Great idea :D

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Desiderium
Desiderium

This comes up when we are about to release. :P Oh well, let's hope people will still enjoy our game. =)

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TheUnabridgedGamer
TheUnabridgedGamer

Sounds good -- I just hope no devs take this to mean that it's better to allow for a cheaper pre-order alpha version than releasing a demo.

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novemberdobby
novemberdobby

Why not both? That's what I did.

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Halfgrin
Halfgrin

Awesome, looking forward to see what games will be using alphafunding as the desura platform keeps maturing.

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Kaira-
Kaira-

Great news :P

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MrMattWebb
MrMattWebb

YES. This is what indie really needs that Steam cannot and will not offer those developers. I like this idea a lot. I hope it picks up and gives Desura the niche market it needs to stand out.

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Tristanjmnz
Tristanjmnz

:C my game was almost on this list.

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Jpmerida
Jpmerida

Well, Maybe next time though.

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thedarkwolf333
thedarkwolf333

Are there any limitations to this in terms of the technology being used to develop the games? For instance, we are using the UDK. Will that pose a problem?

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novemberdobby
novemberdobby

I don't think the tech matters at all - anything is deliverable by Desura.

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BlueWolf72
BlueWolf72

if i ever find a coder and a team i can trust to not jump ship I will be in contact. :(

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formerlyknownasMrCP
formerlyknownasMrCP

Thankyou Scott and the ModDB team for finally implementing this. Its so awesome to see this, and hopefully it'll cut down on people using Kickstarter ect on this site because it impacts negatively on the community with them doing this. If its through desura then the entire community benefits from it and everyone is protected from potential scams that do very much exist on services such as Kickstarter.

I'm expecting good things from this. Best of luck guys.

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BitPuffin
BitPuffin

Well what if you are making games full time and want to be able to eat food?

Think about it.

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xXMaNiAcXx
xXMaNiAcXx

Project Zomboid: Amazing game you got there.

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Ennui
Ennui

Awesome. LONG LIVE INDIE GAMES!

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Calbino
Calbino

(buried)

Forget Desura, a-holes had the gall to launch a video advertisement when I launched an indie game demo. That advertising money better be going to the developers.

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Henley
Henley

That would be a add for new content on Desura. We make no money from that. There are no add on Desura.

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ArcadeFiction
ArcadeFiction

Great idea. Desura is on the ball. Keep up the good work.

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SolidFake
SolidFake

survivors of ragnarok, king arthur's gold and Rotion really deserve alpha funding...
that's why I instabought them

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TheJP3372
TheJP3372

So far, indies are pwning other major Companies with awsome games like Minecraft and Project Zomboid :3

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Toa
Toa

Ive bought the Project Zomboid game and im loving it. i like seing how it`s gradually changing with every patch

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franx12
franx12

Project Zomboid and Towns are two games that are on my list. I'm getting both soon enough (tried and loved both the demos), and will continue supporting devs through Alphafunding both as a gamer and a future wannabe Indie developer, as it opens up great opportunities for most developers. That's why I love Desura :D

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Ysa
Ysa

Great selection of games! I hope the Alphafunding catalog keeps growing.

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Mikael1987
Mikael1987

Don't mean to sound stupid,but I haven't actually read it anywhere,when you alpha-found a game,are you actually "Buying" the game,or will you have to pay more once it gets oficially released?. Thanks in advanced.

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GrandBureaucrat
GrandBureaucrat

You're going to receive a copy of the finished game AND get access to the pre-released versions.

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