The don't actually get that $5,000. It's worrying that that amount was pledged, but Kickstarter / Amazon Payments doesn't charge until after a project is complete, and in the case of an unfinished, canceled project, never.

No, they get paid once the project reaches its goal and the time runs out. There's no guarantee that your money is going towards a project that gets finished.

> and in the case of an unfinished [...] never.

That is incorrect. The money is transferred once funding period has ended if funding goals have been reached.

From that point on, the project authorship has the money (minus Amazon's and Kickstarter's shares) and may never get it done still.

Source: funded half a dozen of KS so far, I know when money leaves me. It would also completely unmake the point of kickstarter: it's about providing funds for the project to be done, not guaranteeing sales so people can go get institutional investors showing they have 3 million sales in already (especially since most KS are a few thousand, the current million+ craze is not the median project)

You are correct, but nevertheless, they did not get the $5000. The funding goal was $80 000 and they got nowhere near that. So that was a scam that did not work.

This is only because the project was rumbled so quickly after it was launched. If they had maybe spent a few hours time mocking up some original images they could have been on their way to a fully funded project.

Half of that $5000 is from a single pledge. Is it possible that they pledged $2500 to themselves to make it look like their project is getting more attention than it actually is? Or does someone out there just really really want this game?

Mostly likely that's exactly what it is. I know if I were to run a scam like this, the first thing I'd do is a bunch of fake pledges to drive eyeballs. I think the total overhead is about 10% (split between Amazon and Kickstarter), and of course you only end up paying it if the scam is a success.

You wouldn't actually need to pay the money. You'd just need to make sure it got pre-authorized. Then once you got another legitimate pledges you could withdraw your fake ones (or leave them up but without any money in the accounts, I believe it's fairly common for KS not to be able to collect al the pledges at the end)

Known as "salting" (found out in Cialdini's Influence)

How were the stolen images tracked down? Through services like TinEye?

I'm really sorry, but I have to ask... do you perchance work for a game development firm in Washington?

> yet they still managed to get nearly $5,000 in the few hours it was up, which is quite worrying.

Well, the funding was canceled, which according to the FAQ means that all pledges are voided. So they actually managed to get exactly $0.

I like the t-shirt and the bag too. You can clearly see it hasn't been screenprinted. It's been done in Photoshop.

To be fair, that's what I would do if I was doing a legit product- mock up the t's and bags, then get them printed once the money is received.