I understand sort of where he is coming from, but it almost seems that the dude doesn't grasp the whole reason people gave the studio money. I get that he thinks 'big' Japanese developers have taken over Kickstarter and have been basically robbing the place blind without contributing new ideas (or so he thinks, we don't know what some of these games will offer).
We had a Mega Man 'clone', we have another one for legends, another one for Bloodstained (aka Castlevania) that broke records and now Shenmue 3.
I get that, but does he understand that indies have been keeping alive by copying these dudes works? How many indie games ripped off a game by Yu Suzuki? Right now retro racing games are in, there was even a light gun shooter that was on there not too long ago.
He assumes Kickstarter is started to help indies develop games, but it really wasn't. IT was made for people that don't have other ways of funding a project to fund it. Anyone, including someone like Yu Suzuki, who has over 30 years in the gaming industry, then don't.
I find it funny that instead of addressing issues with why indie games aren't getting as much funding as Shenmue 3, he just decides to attack it. Sounds like he should take that attitude and turn around to work on another half thought out licensed game like Korra or the new Transformers.
I guess he is salty that Wonderful 101 didn't do so well or that most of their successful projects involved other people's IPs
Seriously though, I understand that JP has a point (no one is arguing that Awesome Japan botched the majority of the campaign, thankfully the fanbase did its best to pick up the slack), but he seems to be giving off mixed messages.
I fully agree that KS is a place to fund ideas when there is no other option is available (or for developers when publishers have passed on it), the only one game developer I think would never need KS is Hideo Kojima, everyone else is fair game (especially IGA and Yu Suzuki).
I remember hearing this argument earlier (about bigger KSes "stealing" from indies), shortly before the Shenmue 3 Kickstarter was even teased, if anything these more well known kickstarters bring more attention to kickstarter/crowd funding...but looking through the comments he even shot down that side of the argument.
That book comment is funny because you could say the same thing about Bayo 2 with an anime. Platinum had one of their passion projects canceled, only for Nintendo to pick up shortly after, they've been up and down the aisle saying that this project wouldn't have existed without that funding...so why is it he bags on Shenmue despite it being stuck without a sequel for years only for an opportunity to finally present itself on Kickstarter and actually see results? "Just because you break a record, doesn't mean you're successful" Honestly? fuck off then.
I don't think old ideas can't be used to influence/create new ones, they can beneficial if one looks/studies them, JP just has such a hard on for "TRYING TO CREATE SOMETHING NEW! CAN'T WAIT FOR DAT SCALEBOUND! IT'S GONNA BLOW YOUR MINDS! IT'S SO ORIGINAL"