Something strange happened today. Being a sentimental sort, I’m ordinarily quite an easy target for Kickstarter campaigns that try to push my nostalgia buttons. In fact, on more than one occasion since the Double Fine funding campaign have I backed a project before even watching the pitch video. So it seemed only logical that when a new installment of a game that defined a huge part of my childhood came along, I’d be all over it. The game, of course, is Elite, created by David Braben and Ian Bell. Today, Braben launched a funding drive to collect the equivalent of nearly $2 mil to make a new Elite game. I’ve imagined this day happening, and in my mind it seemed so grand. And yet, here it is, and I don’t feel anything even close to ecstatic. Quite the opposite. Cynicism and mistrust kicked in almost immediately, irrationally perhaps, but I know where it all comes from.

Read the rest of this entry →