Brno, Czech Republic – March 1, 2013 – CBE software announces start of a crowdfunding campaign targeted at creation of an enhanced edition of J.U.L.I.A., narrative driven, interface based PC videogame released in 2012.

Jan Kavan, CBE software director, explains why yet another crowdfunding appears on the game industry map: “When we've released J.U.L.I.A. back in 2012, the response especially from the adventure gaming community was amazing. Even if we knew that this is a new video game format, we've been well accepted and especially the story, music and game flow was generally praised.

The game was also just recently nominated for the best gameplay and the best character (Mobot) by Adventure Gamers - the largest international website specialized on adventure games. This came to us as a big surprise because we've been working on the game for more than 3 years in only two persons. The fact that we've invested only our time and my personal budget however negatively influenced some of the game aspects.

Originally we planned to use the sales budget for the enhanced edition but what we were able to obtain from our former publisher covered merely the legal expenses to reclaim back J.U.L.I.A. rights.”

Regardless of CBE software further fate, CBE software wants to iron some of the rough edges through the community based events tied to this IndieGoGo campaign:

http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/j-u-l-i-a-enhanced-edition

“J.U.L.I.A. is for me an extremely personal game and regardless of what happens next, I want to have the game really polished. I also perceive the crowdfunding process as something more than just getting some cash. We want the community to actively participate through polls, voting and feedback. We’ve set us very modest and realistic goal for this campaign as we want to eliminate the worst problems stemming from our former zero budget situation. That’s why it’s now too early to speak about other exciting possibilities this campaign could open for J.U.L.I.A. One of our primary goals is to let Rachel Manners climb out from the uncanny valley, where she’s now settled in.” explained Jan Kavan.

Among the goals for the enhanced version are:

• Recreating Rachel Manners from scratch
• Redesigning some of the game interface
• Introducing easy mode for problematic puzzles.
• Making some of the game parts optional (eg. material harvesting)
• Polishing some of the puzzles responsiveness and descriptions
• Extending some of the looping music tracks.
• Refine a few parts of the script when the game gets ridiculous / over the top.

The campaign is set for a fixed amount of $5000. It will end up on Friday 12th April 2013 at 11:59 PT. If CBE software doesn’t reach the target by that time, the money will return to contributors automatically. CBE software believes that this is more fair approach concerning the associated risks of the contributors.

About J.U.L.I.A.

J.U.L.I.A. is an innovative, narrative driven PC game. The story centers on Rachel Manners, a 35 year old astrobiologist. She is a member of an elite group of scientists, chosen to embark on one of the most critical missions ever conceived on Earth. Now Rachel is alone, orbiting an unknown planet. Her only companions are J.U.L.I.A., the space probe’s artificial intelligence and Mobot, a huge reconnaissance robot. Together, this unlikely trio will explore the mysteries of the solar system of Salia. But are they prepared for what they will find?

I love the concept. We should focus on making absolutely horrible games and then make a Kickstarter project where we promise (with enough pledges of course) that we'll stop making games altogether. Sometimes reading some of the teen comments at the mainstream forums tells me that this would be the most successful project ever kickstarted.