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CollectorVision Phoenix Kickstarter is now live!


Bmack36

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Okay, so I've been monitoring this Kickstarter campaign over the last 24 hours, and trying to wrap my head around the "apparent realities" of it. So if I understand the situation correctly, the $232K target is based on the need to produce and sell at least 1000 units, in order to bring the cost down to 200$ per unit? If this is the case, then this Kickstarter strategy is not the correct one, in my humble opinion.

 

 

I would also see if the controllers from AtGames' ColecoVision Flashback could be used on the Phoenix. They're not the best controllers ever, but they're relatively brand new compared to the old original Coleco controllers, so that's a plus, especially for casual gamers who are not going to play with their Phoenix system often.

 

 

The point of Kickstarter is that they need $230,000 to get the injection molded cases, pcbs made in China, etc. If they were not trying to make at least 1,000 units, they would only need maybe $50,000 or $100,000 but each unit would cost $300 to $400. (All of my numbers are estimations to illustrate my point). I am assuming CollectorVision doesn't have $230,000 in their bank account right now. Unless CollectorVision has that money to fund the production, or they have an investor or bank willing to lend them the money, Kickstarter is the only real option to get the money. Also, they only get the money if they reach their goal, so they don't lose anything if the project fails to get funded. Where as if they spend $230,000 of their own money, and they only sell 200 units, they have 800 unsold units instead of the money in their bank account.

 

Can we please let the AtGames ColecoVision flashback die already. Those ColecoVision flashback controllers are such garbage. If you open it up, its the cheapest of the cheap China crap. They are so low quality, I wouldn't invest any time or money in making anything work with them. You really need to open one up and see how thin the pcb is, how poor the soldering is, and how the wires inside are almost falling off a brand new never used controller. There is no reason to use the CV flashback controllers with anything else besides the CV flashback. I understand original CV controllers are not that good, but there are other solutions to use alternate controllers. The reason they made the system work with SNES controllers and SNES NTT controllers is because SNES controllers are very good quality, and easy find in good condition.

 

Edited by Hannacek
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Can we please let the AtGames ColecoVision flashback die already. Those ColecoVision flashback controllers are such garbage. If you open it up, its the cheapest of the cheap China crap. They are so low quality, I wouldn't invest any time or money in making anything work with them. You really need to open one up and see how thin the pcb is, how poor the soldering is, and how the wires inside are almost falling off a brand new never used controller. There is no reason to use the CV flashback controllers with anything else besides the CV flashback. I understand original CV controllers are not that good, but there are other solutions to use alternate controllers. The reason they made the system work with SNES controllers and SNES NTT controllers is because SNES controllers are very good quality, and easy find in good condition.

 

I don't have any issues with the Flashback controllers. They work fine. My only gripe is the nubby stick but other than that I use them from time to time.

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Looking good, Collectorvision. It will be terrific to have a modern, expanded, working console for Colecovision releases, providing everything that a fan of this era of retro gaming needs.

 

I hope you can meet your goal and therefore meet the $200ish price point. I've been continually impressed by the work being done by programmers (here at this site!) for the Colecovision system today. Turns out that Colecovision hardware is capable of miracles, given a little help (and the expanded power of the Super Game Module or this console).

 

I don't think that $230K is too much to ask - obviously it's not cheap to produce a new, full console in bulk, so that sounds about right. Is it doable? Well, I regularly see Kickstarters for card games, board games and video games break the $500k mark, if they go viral.

 

I do think this console needs our help to go viral outside of our own little community, and I hope people will share this link on every social media they've got so the Kickstarter has a better chance of succeeding.

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Okay, so I've been monitoring this Kickstarter campaign over the last 24 hours, and trying to wrap my head around the "apparent realities" of it. So if I understand the situation correctly, the $232K target is based on the need to produce and sell at least 1000 units, in order to bring the cost down to 200$ per unit? If this is the case, then this Kickstarter strategy is not the correct one, in my humble opinion.

 

To reach the magic number of 1000 units, the main goal should be to make this console available at GameStop, EB-Games, and any other outlets with several accessible locations across North-America. Amazon, eBay and other online outlets also deserve serious consideration in the marketing strategy. The Kickstarter angle should only be used to, well, kick-start the project's development: You gather money from CV fans to finance the development of the injection mold for the outer console casing, then you make a few more prototypes with the final casing, which you can show off at any opportunity (retrogaming conventions, meetings with sales representatives of GameStop and EB-Games, etc.). That's pretty much "phase 1" of the entire project, where you get to dip your toes in the lake and figure out the actual demand for this FPGA console. With the millions of people living in North-America today, I'm sure you can find 1000 customers who will purchase this machine, but certainly not in the span of a single month. Reaching the milestone of 1000 units sold is going to be a long-winded effort.

 

So anyway, "phase 2" is finding money to purchase the "priority components", which are the components that may become unavailable just a few years from now. I'm mostly thinking of the Spartan FPGA when I say this, but there are other components too, like the 30-pin cartridge port or the Super-NES controller connector, which may be relatively easy to source now, but may become harder to find in barely two years. The idea is to have a good stock of those master components, so you can be sure to meet your supply goals in the foreseeable future. I'm really not sure where the funding for this second phase could come from, using Kickstarter again may not be a good idea... This is bound to be the most difficult step.

 

From there, it's all about production, packaging, retail channeling and visibility, and you keep at it until all 1000 units have been sold. I wonder if it would be possible to release some complete-in-box repros of such classics as Venture, Time Pilot, Roc 'n Rope, etc. just to give people something to buy along with the Phoenix. Homebrews are a good selling point too, of course.

 

The point I'm trying to make is that keeping the 200$ pricetag target is doable, but only over an extended period of time, to give all the potential buyers time to discover the product and make it available to them when they're ready to buy it. In parallel, some good uses for the keyboard connector and the SD card slot should be devised and advertised, like the MSX core, and other FPGA cores. If I was an active participant in the project, I would also see if the controllers from AtGames' ColecoVision Flashback could be used on the Phoenix. They're not the best controllers ever, but they're relatively brand new compared to the old original Coleco controllers, so that's a plus, especially for casual gamers who are not going to play with their Phoenix system often.

 

As a side note, I've never pledged any money on any Kickstarter project before, and up until now, I assumed they took Paypal, which they apparently do not. I pride myself on not having a credit card (I understand that some may find this stance debatable) and I'm certainly not going to get one just for this. So I guess I won't be participating in the Kickstarter campaign, even though I want to.

 

Finally, I'd like to point out that the 230,000$ target displayed at the top of the Kickstarter page is very likely to illicit negative reactions. Many people who could be interested in the Phoenix are just going to pass on it because they will assume that the target won't be met anyway, especially in just a month. Like I said in the beginning of this post, this Kickstarter strategy is unlikely to pay off.

 

It makes sense, but this kickstarter could be also simply a means to evaluate roughtly how much you can hope as minimum if you release the product (even without being founded by the kickstarter itself)

 

That could be a good tool to start a market study.

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Well I'm in, I hope you guys reach your goal.

 

FYI, I've been around some Kickstarter campaigns before that failed because their goal was too high - people are hesitant to back because they have low faith the project will reach its goal. But sometimes if goals are set a bit lower, they meet and then plow through their target goals. Just a thought.

 

I hope this does happen. Good guys behind a great product.

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People on twitter, including Voultar, already think this is Mike Kennedy and Coleco again. Not a good sign.

 

That's because people are idiots and they don't want to bother to read or look at anything, they just want to make broad assumptions until someone else comes along and corrects them. To which they will just get upset about that, too...

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For those of you who would like to see a demo of the CollectorVision Phoenix, I was happy to receive a prototype version today to produce some videos with! More than happy to help these guys spread the good word about this console!

 

 

Back the project: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1408938247/collectorvision-phoenix-an-fpga-colecovision-conso/

 

Here is the link to this video on Facebook. Please share this video on Facebook with as many Retrogaming pages or groups as you know to help spread the word about the Kickstarter! It's going to need as much word of mouth as it can get!

https://www.facebook.com/colecovisionfan/videos/337429840345689/

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I funded the project.

 

Post that video to Youtube, pronto! We need to get this to go viral... I think then it has an excellent chance of getting completely funded. The key is to spread the word on as many retro gaming forums, etc as possible.

 

I think 1000 units is doable, but it is going to be a challenge to fund. 250 or 500 would be a sure thing.

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I funded the project.

 

Post that video to Youtube, pronto! We need to get this to go viral... I think then it has an excellent chance of getting completely funded. The key is to spread the word on as many retro gaming forums, etc as possible.

 

I think 1000 units is doable, but it is going to be a challenge to fund. 250 or 500 would be a sure thing.

 

If someone could make sure that video gets posted to places like Reddit and Discord that would be very helpful! Here's the YouTube link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mX8Frd_6t3M
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If someone could make sure that video gets posted to places like Reddit and Discord that would be very helpful! Here's the YouTube link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mX8Frd_6t3M
 
I shared this over at Reddit. I feel like we can't stress enough that it isn't affiliated with Kennedy or Coleco.

 

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-J727AZ using Tapatalk

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I shared this over at Reddit. I feel like we can't stress enough that it isn't affiliated with Kennedy or Coleco.

 

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-J727AZ using Tapatalk

 

Precisely why less than 30 seconds into that video I put....

GOPR0899.00_00_29_16.Still051.jpg

:D :D :D

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I hope this makes that goal. I'm seeing about funding now, and I'm probably on board.

It seems like good value for money with all the built-in games and the pack-in cart.

 

I've already got an NT mini, which does seem to do coleco great, but I'm into this for the wider controller options, cart slot, and especially that sweet SGM support for new games. I've never really been able to support coleco homebrew before. Is there a lot of interest in homebrew rom selling for this thing? I vaguely remember that being a landmine on one of the systems around here, but can't recall which. (honestly asking, not trolling, if this happens to be that system)

Edited by Reaperman
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Is there a lot of interest in homebrew rom selling for this thing? I vaguely remember that being a landmine on one of the systems around here, but can't recall which. (honestly asking, not trolling, if this happens to be that system)

 

We (Team Pixelboy, Opcode, CollectorVision and most homebrewers) usually just release our rom files without asking any money

Once a year or something similar to that

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I backed with the CIB Sydney Hunter game this morning as well. I also watched TPR's review of the prototype.

 

It looked like it was using the standard Coleco BIOS screen, but he said the final would be a CollectorVision one. Is it going to be possible to switch between them? Understanding there may be legal issues if it shipped with the standard. But could you supply your own on the SD card if you want that nostalgic look?

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