‘Blood Sport’ Kickstarter Suspended

That didn’t take long.

Just days after the Blood Sport Kickstarter began to gain (unwanted) traction in the gaming media, the site has decided to suspend the game’s crowd funding campaign. Kickstarter did not provide a reason for the suspension, however, citing a “no comment” policy concerning such matters.

For those who may not have heard of it, Blood Sport was an interactive experience meant to make the act of donating blood a little more competitive. Essentially, the game would draw a bit of blood every time a player took damage from a virtual experience. The Blood Sport team’s hope was that the game would help increase interest in donating blood, but the crowd funding campaign drew much more than that.

The Blood Sport Kickstarter actually began on November 18th and was seeking $222,000 from backers. The hope was to use that money to take their single player concept and modify it for multiplayer. That way, two donors could play a game against each other while donating at the same time.

Obviously, there are many red flags with a product like this, not the least of which is the fact Blood Sport draws human blood any time one player inflicts damage on another. There were considerations built in place so the device never drew too much blood, and the donation would be monitored by a certified professional, but gamers still seemed wary.

While the Blood Sport idea may have been noble in principle, the Kickstarter campaign promo video was hardly indicative of a product looking to boost blood shortage awareness. Rather, Blood Sport seemed more like another notch in the anti-video game violence groups’ belt and a lawyer’s dream product.

So, rather than try to navigate the red tape associated with such a controversial product, Kickstarter decided to pull the campaign from their site. Again, they wouldn’t say why, but chances are the site received its fair share of negative e-mails regarding the campaign. For that matter, it seemed unlikely that Blood Sport would even reach its crowd funding goal; the product had only accrued $3,000 after a few days.

At the same time, this doesn’t spell the end for Blood Sport. The product can still move onto another crowd funding site or even start its own crowd funding campaign (like Star Citizen did) to try to raise money. Perhaps if they focused a little more on the utility of the game and less on the idea of spilling an opponent’s blood they would have better success.

Are you surprised to see Kickstarter pull the Blood Sport campaign? Would something like that have increased your interest in donating blood?

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Source: Cnet

‘Blood Sport’ Kickstarter Suspended