then you personally are under no obligation to donate.

personally i don't care about any of those tables you mentioned, but i wouldn't whine if they tried to get them made somehow.

personally i was very very excited to see STTNG, T2, and judging by the success of those kick starters, so were a lot of people. nobody forced anyone to donate. i fully understand that these tables are more expensive to produce due to the licenses, and in order to make it profitable, they are using kickstarter. i don't see why this is making people so angry.

well, the thing is you have to understand that the options are either Kickstarter TAF versus no TAF, not Kickstarter TAF versus traditional pay model TAF. the upside of Kickstarter is that it allows a lot of things to get created that wouldn't otherwise be economically feasible. i've donated to 5 or 6 Kickstarters and been pretty happy with the results. granted they were pretty high-profile ones from established people in their respective industries. i'm not a fan of the "fund my trip to europe on the premise that i'll eventually write a book or something!" Kickstarters.

excellent comparison. the most valuable company on earth is totally comparable to a small software house with maybe a half dozen programmers.

i was going to make a "...and stop calling me Shirley" joke, but it doesn't work if you're actually calling me Shirley.

well, a new game is a risky proposition with a lot of unknowns. but at this point in TPA's development, FarSight undoubtedly has a very good idea how many tables they are going to sell of a given title. they probably know if they spend $10k on licensing rights they will still make a profit but if they spend $80k on licensing rights they will lose money (made up numbers, but you get the idea). people hound them every day for TAF, so they are giving people a way to make that happen that results in them not losing money on it. if the people want it badly enough to make it profitable, they will get it.

Revenue is meaningless without knowing their expenses. I can't believe I have to point that out.

what does that have to do with anything? like I said, they are saying the license for Addams Family costs more than they would make from selling the table in TPA. posting their yearly revenue doesn't even come close to being relevant to that.

what makes you think they're mismanaging expenses? as has been stated a bunch of times:

1. they have said all along that the Addams Family license is expensive to the point that creating the table would not be profitable for them.
2. people hound them every day for TAF.
3. they say "ok, we can do it, if the people want it badly enough to subsidize it".

what is the problem? if you don't want TAF in TPA then don't contribute to the Kickstarter. there's no reason to kick mud on FarSight for trying to find a way to make the table happen.

producing a product (say, TAF in TPA) that you know will cost more money than it will make is a bad business decision no matter how profitable your company is.

I agree with you that cabinet support is one thing they have failed to deliver on, but I don't know what you're talking about regarding "took the money and ran" from the kickstarters. the STTNG, TZ, and T2 tables they produced with that money are among TPA's finest tables.

sure. I mean if you just think they're a bunch of shameless liars, that is your prerogative. but they have consistently said the same thing about every high-profile license since the beginning, and I don't really see any evidence that they're swimming in cash.

we don't know yet. maybe we'll learn more when they launch the kickstarter.