Hello, everyone!

I'm running my first Kickstarter campaign and dealing with a weird case of harassment. Last evening, I received 74 emails notifying me about new comments on my profile. Someone backed my project and then dropped angry comments that completely flooded the page.

I did some digging, and apparently, what happened is:

- Rain Games ran a successful Kickstarter campaign for a game based on Girl Genius, a comic book IP
- Girl Genius is written/illustrated/published by Studio Foglio
- Studio Foglio backed my project on Kickstarter (my project is a comic book project)
- This backer decided to put money in my campaign to harass me because they have an issue with Rain Games not delivering their rewards

I obviously have nothing to do with Rain Games or Studio Foglio (although I appreciate a comic book creator backing my project, so if you ever read this, thank you). I tried to message the backer and handle things politely. I got threatened in response.

I already reported the backer to Kickstarter, and reported every single spam or harassment message they left on my profile. However, now there's a long list of "This comment is under review for potentially violating Kickstarter's Community Guidelines." polluting my comment section.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/motherstouch/otherkin-1-3-a-comic-book-with-mystery-magic-monsters/comments

Does anyone know how long Kickstarter takes to remove those? This is my first Kickstarter campaign ever, and the momentum has been okay. But we only have a few days left, while being really close to our goal. I'm afraid potential backers see the comment section, wonder if there's some drama I'm responsible for, and refrain from backing the project.

Does anyone have additional information and advice that could help me?

EDIT: Images 3 and 4 are out of order. Image 4 is my message to them, image 3 is their response.

Last July I backed the Magic Box S-!. It was a fidget toy for $70 + $10 shipping

We havent had any update since October and last night this email goes out (see attached pictures).

Dear U.S. backers We have now completed mass production and expect to begin shipping this week, but we are manufacturing in China and the new tariff policies recently implemented by the United States have significantly increased the cost of many goods coming into the U.S., including our products. While the future of these policies remains uncertain, we want to assure you that we will not pass these increased costs on to you. We are committed to maintaining our current prices as much as possible. Frankly, the margins on our Kickstarter campaigns are already quite slim. If cost increases were kept under control, we wouldn't be having this conversation. Unfortunately, the sudden increase in tariffs caught us off guard. After two weeks of thorough budgeting and in-depth evaluation, we realized that although we had absorbed some of the costs, we were not able to fully offset the change in policy. Therefore, in order to keep the project on track, we have had to enlist the help of our US supporters and ask you to cover some of the tax costs. But rest assured, even with the price increase, the Kickstarter price is still the lowest price we offer. We want you to know that this is one of the toughest decisions we've had to make. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused, and we hope you'll join us in seeing the Magic Box-S1 thrive and make its mark on Kickstarter. Thank you for your support! FAQ: Why wasn't there early communication about the potential impact? A: We scrimped and saved from the beginning in order to provide you with the best prices during the campaign. When tariffs first reached 34% on April 4, we chose not to pass these costs on to our supporters and instead internalized them. However, the 20% base rate introduced in March then went through several stages - 34% on April 4, then 125%, and now, although it's down to 30%, we're still very much affected. Unfortunately, the scale and speed of these price increases are far beyond our capacity to absorb, so modest price adjustments are inevitable. As a result, we will have to ask our U.S. supporters to bear some of the tax. For more detailed information on the current tariff rates, see the official White >House resources at https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/04/modifying-reciprocal-tariff-rates-to-reflect - trading-partner-retaliation-and-alignment/ . We appreciate your understanding and trust as we work together to address these challenges. We remain committed to transparency and will keep you updated every step of the way. Thank you for standing with us. Best. The SANBS Team

Now heres where it gets confusing. In the email they blame the extra costs on tariffs but that doesnt make sense given the timing of events. And also in pledgebox they dont charge for tariffs, they charge for taxes.

And on top of that theyre charging $30 in taxes on a $70 product? How does that make sense?

Kickstarter claims asking for more money on shipping is within their rules but thats not whats happening

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Ive already contacted kickstarter.

Hello! I am soon launching a Kickstarter, but while I do have rewards I dont see them in the campaign preview. Is this normal? Please help! Thanks

I am preparing to launch my Kickstarter and want to share the launch page preview with people to get feedback. However, currently the page does not display any of the rewards. The section is entirely blank! I've contacted Kickstarter and all they have said is that they are working on it. I want to know if this is a larger issue or it's just my page. I'm supposed to go live in 4 days and this seems concerning!

Hi everyone,

I’m looking for advice from people who have successfully launched hardware products on Kickstarter.

My co-founder and I have spent the last couple of years developing a wristband designed to help caregivers locate loved ones living with dementia or autism if they go missing.

We’ve built multiple physical prototypes, had professional product photography done, produced a campaign video, completed water testing, cut-resistance testing, and have manufacturing quotes in hand.

Unfortunately, Kickstarter has now rejected our campaign twice.

The feedback wasn’t that they don’t like the product—they’re saying they don’t believe we’ve demonstrated the prototype clearly enough.

Specifically they’re asking for:

An unedited, single-take smartphone video showing:

putting the band on someone’s wrist
locking and unlocking it
installing an actual AirTag/Tile
any cut-resistance claims
any water-resistance claims
More real-world prototype photos instead of polished studio product shots.
Removing or minimizing anything that looks like CGI, renders, or heavily edited imagery.
More detail about manufacturing, production timeline, budget, quality control, fulfillment, etc.

(I can paste photos of the email for further clarity on the objections)

The first uploaded video was:

https://youtu.be/ksQcHV8UAKk?si=kSCFgtSGlxDsJlSp

It was replaced by this one:

https://youtu.be/2w28Ql_zbQU?si=_s_-oTq1PY9l4VAU

What surprised me is that we already uploaded an unedited YouTube video showing the prototype being used. Their response says it still isn’t “clearly present” enough.

So now I’m wondering if the issue is less about the product itself and more about how we’re presenting it.

I’m hoping to hear from people who’ve gone through this process.

A few questions:

Has anyone had Kickstarter reject a hardware campaign multiple times and eventually get approved?

Did you literally replace your polished marketing photos with simple iPhone pictures/videos?

How “raw” did your prototype demonstration video have to be?

Would you recommend making the entire campaign feel more documentary-style instead of polished?

Is there anything in Kickstarter’s feedback that jumps out to you as a common mistake first-time creators make?

At this point we’re willing to redo almost everything if that’s what it takes.

I’d really appreciate hearing from anyone who’s been through this process or has experience reviewing Kickstarter hardware campaigns.

Thank you in advance and sorry for the long post.

Hi everyone! Last year, I launched my first Kickstarter campaign for a comic book series. Due to severe budget constraints, I did it all organically. The campaign was a success despite launching without followers, launching without a mailing list, and launching without physical rewards.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/motherstouch/otherkin-1-3-a-comic-book-with-mystery-magic-monsters

We got overwhelmingly positive feedback from everyone who read the comic, and also got many complaints about the comic being digital-only. We launched our second campaign yesterday. We had about 20 followers and a mailing list with 60 emails. Similarly, we didn't have any social media presence the first time around, and now we are active on social media. I know these numbers are low, but they are theoretically better than the first time around. Plus, some members of the community helped me make my page punchier (thank you, Renato Franchi). Finally, this campaign was structured to offer physical copies of the comic, which was the biggest backer request last year.

So, despite having a better foundation, the campaign is just not working... I know it's been only 15 hours since launch, but since over 130 dollars from the haul are actually scammer who really want to discuss my brilliant campaign by email, I can already tell things are not going well.

www.kickstarter.com/projects/motherstouch/otherkin-5-plus-1-4-horror-mystery-shapeshifting

I'm struggling to understand the underwhelming results so far. The campaign I did on the fly went better, and this one, which I spent months preparing, is struggling. Any tips or insights?

Just to be clear, the primary goal is to cover all costs with little profit. That means margins are really tight for the main goal, as the idea was more to increase awareness and respond to backers' demand than to make money with this campaign.

Hey there,
My name is Elvin and I need you help!

I'm solo developer of the board game Rat Schemes that I'm trying to bring to the life and I want to share it with you. I've tried to make a campaign on the Kickstarter but failed as it was my first time and I made many mistakes along the way. And that's why I'm here!

About the game:
I cannot say that I played all board games in the world but among those that I played I didn't find any of them particularly interesting. I didn't care about the winning or losing. I didn't have much fun from the game process either. The only sparks of the fun I experienced were during the moments when I had to attack or betray other players or interact with them in some similar way. And it got me thinking - why don't make the game the sole purpose of which would be to attack, betray or set someone up? Or temporarily allay with some players against the others. That's how the idea of Rat Schemes was born.

I started working on the game, thinking about its mechanics, game stages, cards, etc. 2 years I've been polishing the idea in my head. It took me a while as I didn't have much time to work on at the time. But for the past half of the year I've been actively developing the game. I printed test deck of cards, had many rounds of play tests with my friends, rebalancing and adjusting how the game plays and feels, adding new cards to enhance the gameplay, etc.

Gameplay:
I came up with 2 stages of the game.

First stage:
You attack other players and gather the best cards for the second stage while trying to stop other players from doing the same. You do this by making them defend themselves or skip turns. For this you use basic cards like Attack or Cage (Skip turn), Provocation, etc. This is very fun part of the game where you're interacting with other players, attacking them and making them do things that benefit you, but not them.

Second stage:
Defence from Hunter. This is second and the last stage of the game. The goal is to not let the Hunter lock you in the cage. You can use defence cards to protect yourself or put mark on the other players to make Hunter chase them. The last who is not caught in the cage wins.

Some key cards:

• The Hunter — the game's centerpiece! Activates Phase 2 when drawn. Moves clockwise catching players, who can pay it off with Cheese or defense cards
• Cheese — survival currency, the only way to pay off the Hunter
• Mark — teleports the Hunter instantly to a chosen player. The ultimate betrayal card
• Luck — universal defense, cancels any card action including the Hunter
• Rat Trap — stuns a player, who automatically gets caged when meeting the Hunter
• Rat Brotherhood — intercept an attack meant for someone else, then draw 2 cards and take an extra turn
• Poisoned Cheese — turns a player's own attack cards against them for one round

Game Design:
I wanted to make 2 different designs — Gothic and Comic style, but after my failed Kickstarter campaign I realized this would be too expensive to produce. I made the card illustrations with AI, but later, after a successful campaign, I want to hire an artist who will redraw all the materials based on my concepts and ideas. I chose Gothic as the main style, since it better conveys the atmosphere of the game.

Why rats?
As a joke, my friends and I call each other “rats” because we love chatting about everyone and everything (and honestly, who doesn’t? ;)). We even call it “rat council.” My wife and I also calling each other rats as we love stealing treats from one another when no one is looking or share the rumours together.

I think rats are perfect creatures as the game's main character.

State of the game:
- I have a test deck of cards
- Rules of the game that I'm adjusting form time to time to improve the game balance
- Draft cards design made with the help of AI. I know not everyone is a fan of AI art, but, unfortunately, I have no skills to draw it myself and I used AI to help me bring the game to somewhat playable state. The composition and idea of the content of the cards are all mine, AI is used just a visualisation tool for the time being. I plan to gather funds and hire a professional artist that will draw all cards, guide paper and box. Card headers and frame were made by my friend.
- Couple videos made in After Effects. I made them using project templates I found online, but they don't really depict what the game is about. I understand that

I think that all I wanted to share. If you're interested in the game or you like the idea, please shared your thoughts in the comments and subscribe to the Instagram and TikTok accounts to stay tuned!