Review Fix Exclusive: Q & A with ‘Revelation’ Developer Don Goddard

Review Fix chats with “Revelation” Developer Don Goddard, who discusses the interesting UFO-simulation and the Kickstarter behind it. With a slew of wacky videos on the Internet and his charismatic approach, Goddard is hoping Kickstarter and gamers across the world help him make the game a reality.

For more information on the game, click here.

Review Fix: What was the inspiration for the game?

Don Goddard: First, Robert Goddard – Although we aren’t directly related, as he has no children, he’s an influence to most Goddards and I always wanted to do one better than him. Ultimately, create a flying disc shaped craft using a new form of propulsion. The first step in doing this would be to create a UFO simulation to know how it could behave and how to control it.

Second, Close Encounters of the Third Kind – they did for aliens in movies what Revelation will do for aliens in games. Almost every movie before CEIII was comical, strange, or very unrealistic. CEIII brought in the real wonder, fear and potential of being introduced to another intelligent life form and their technology.

Third, an obsession with UFOs and aliens to the point where I’ve had dreams about them. I’ve dreamed of glorious ones displaying themselves in full view in my back yard as a kid, and I’ve even been offered a ride and taken by hand into a UFO to fly it around. Just for the record, I have no idea or recall about being an abductee or contactee in any way, and these were just dreams, as far as I can remember.

Review Fix: What games do you think this title draws its influences from?

Goddard: Because it’s aerial dogfighting and stealth it draws from the legends in both flight simulations and stealth games. Specifically, flight games like Red Baron, Battle of Britain, Gunship 2000 and the Falcon and F-15 Strike Eagle series. For stealth it has traits of the series for Splinter Cell, Metal Gear Solid and Thief. If you really want to go back their are very strong influences from old or rare games like Choplifter, Typhoon Thompson in Search of the Sea Child, Star Wars (vector arcade game), Starglider, Star Raiders, Mercenary, and probably a dozen other games that will make me sound really old!

Review Fix: Who do you think this game will appeal to the most?

Goddard: Future space pilots of course! Actually, it will almost certainly be teen to adult males who are looking for a deep experience. I’ve played so many games myself that most games are very shallow and empty. What will be surprising and admirable to both female and male players is the extremely emotional connection and moments in the game. Moments such as meeting with other alien life forms and having very intellectual, political and great power struggles will really keep you guessing and motivated; you’ll even see this play out in the AI that follows plot devices designed to make you think and react on the fly. Even more interesting will be discovering whom you really are and what decisions you’ll make after knowing your origin story.

Review Fix: What kind of benefits or awards will people that contributes via Kickstarter be eligible for?

Goddard: I’ll give you a few lead-ins to rewards we haven’t posted yet as well as ones available now. We are giving out typical digital rewards such as the game, manuals, maps, making of videos / blogs. The physical rewards will be of greater and higher quality that most Kickstarters such as all-over-print design T-shirts, custom T-shirts, Bronze busts of aliens, a 16-month Revelation calendar with custom art, unique stickers, and very likely some electric or magnetic items. We’re even considering giving out a custom arcade size UFO crane game based on a prototype by an arcade designer.

But, the best rewards of all are the custom in game content rewards! We want to have gaming clans be able to be in the game for all to see as an actual group of alien or human entities with some special symbols and imagery and even include them in the lore. We are even offering probably the coolest customization in a game ever; the ability to create your own hidden ‘Easter Egg’. By that we mean a hidden feature, image, or text triggered in a special way that only you will be privy to! We are interactively talking with our backers to find out what they’d really like to add in to the game as well.

Review Fix: What’s the reception to the Kickstarter been like so far?

Goddard: Intense but not a lot of people have seen it… kind of like witnessing a real UFO. I had never contemplated this until now, but maybe aliens have had trouble being seen in the real world because they couldn’t get enough people to witness them and believe what they saw. We do have a pretty high conversion rate though as we have been getting at least 8% of viewers buying into the game! We are relying on word of mouth.

We will do everything we can to tell the world so we have been promoting the game in every possible way including preaching on the street at the Game Developers Conference as a Prophet and Men In Black, which made quite a stir (see our Kickstarter Updates). Write to UFO Studios ([email protected]) and tell us what you would like to see from us and we’ll bring it right to you!

Review Fix: What’s the next step if the Kickstarter is unsuccessful?

Goddard: Our plan was to reveal the Kickstarter slowly because the game is called Revelation and you are continually having things revealed in the game. As backers for Kickstarter we didn’t want to have to spoil everything up front by showing all of the spoilers and surprises. If we fail by April 30th, then we will then dissect and probe any flaws and come back significantly stronger and will a playable game prototype.

Normally, in a simulation, it takes months to deliver a prototype with realistic physics and targets to manipulate which costs a lot of money to create. Fortunately, we’re prepared to some degree for this and we will show some gameplay in the coming days. I’ve a strong feeling that this will be a highly abnormal project to back as most people will need to get their hands on a UFO and really give it a spin to commit financial support.

If we have to come back a second time we will purely focus on the demo, making it strong and intense, and putting it and all of our best stuff up front. Ultimately though, if the world doesn’t want UFOs then it will not be for a lack of our trying, but purely for a lack of interest from a world not interested in other intelligent life potentially superior to human beings.

Review Fix: What are your ultimate goals for the game?

Goddard: What a great question and something we have yet to tell anyone on Kickstarter. Revelation is actually the start of a major franchise. With everyone we’ve talked to in a publishing context they all say this is more than a game, that it’s a fantastic franchise that would be great as a TV series, book series, sequel games and a huge line of toys. It’s also a natural evolution for boys who like cars, or trains, or planes, to love UFOs. We were even at a recent coin-op expo for a very specific reason related to Revelation we can’t talk about.

What we can tell you right now is that this is the start of an amazing franchise that will blossom from what several people have told us is the greatest ending to a game of all time. The Bible gives great hints of how Revelation begins, but unless we get funding through Kickstarter no one will see how it ends or what is to follow. It’s up to us to get people to know what we’re developing. It’s really up others to spread the word, and the backers to determine if the world is truly ready for a real alien story and actual alien technology.

Check out Goddard’s Kickstarter Pitch Below:

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 13819 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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