Keiji Inafune's latest Kickstarter campaign falls short, but the game will still be made

The Kickstarter for Keiji Inafune's Red Ash: The Indelible Legend — billed as a spiritual successor to the Mega Man Legends franchise — failed this afternoon, falling well short of a goal it looked like a long shot to make.

The project collected $519,999 in donations; it needed $800,000.

When developing studio Comcept announced last week it had secured a publisher for the game's prologue — "The KalKanon Incident" — donations ground to a halt (and some even were canceled).

Had Comcept made its $800,000 goal the money would have been used to deliver "stretch goals" for additional content in the game. Red Ash: The Indelible Legend — The KalKanon Incident will be made for PlayStation 4, Windows PC and Xbox One.

A Kickstarter for a companion anime, Red Ash: Magicicada, did make its $150,000 target, largely thanks to more than $22,000 in donations on the final day.

Comcept took criticism over its handling of the two Kickstarters, particularly as they were announced with Comcept still yet to deliver another project banking on Inafune's fame as Mega Man's creator — Mighty No. 9, funded at $3,845,170 in October 2013. Mighty No. 9's launch date on consoles, originally billed as Sept. 15, was changed to a placeholder date in 2016 by several major retailers at the end of last week. Deep Silver, the publisher for Mighty No. 9 on consoles, still hasn't explained what is going on there.

The announcement of the publishing arrangement with China-based Fuze also rankled some backers, especially as Comcept originally didn't identify what "stretch goals" would be filled. The studio did in an update later.

Funding for Red Ash: The Indelible Legend was a net negative on the day Comcept announced its publishing deal with Fuze. It recovered and even tallied about $19,000 today, the highest total since July 17, but full funding never appeared likely.