Kickstarter: How do you put a price on your own time for a project?

Basically your cost is the amount that would make it worth to you to do the project and not have a separate job at the same time. Enough to cover living expenses for the perceived time of development.

If you're doing it purely for fun.. and you would make and finish the project even without funding.. then you don't *need* funding (nothing wrong with asking for it though)... if you have no costs (doing your own art, music etc.) and you're doing it in your spare time outside of work.. you don't *need* funding..

But you could think of the opportunity cost.. all this time spent working for free (while enjoyable) could be spent doing something else productive (working an extra part time job, studying to upgrade your skills, working overtime etc.) it's really all very subjective.. there is no correct/just/unjust price.. it's what you're willing to work for (and what people are willing to pay). Ask for as much as you think you can get.

When I ran my Kickstarter, it was mostly to cover external media needs for the game (sound effects), some video conversion software, server/website costs, and backer reward costs. After we got everything we needed, we used the extra for some other hardware/software purchases related to making the game and then the rest we ended up putting back into other kickstarter projects or donated to people in the community. The MMF2 game Freedom Planet, thatguyoverthere123 on youtube for his amazing MMF tuts, and a few others

Since I enjoy making games as a hobby, I didn't really feel it fit to make a goal that included the time put into it (which is also why I didn't feel bad that it still took me like 2 years after the Kickstarter to get the game out). I just did a good job of keeping my backers in the loop as I progressed so they knew it wasn't a dead project.

You either go 1 of 2 routes:

1. You're doing it as a hobby in your free time, money is not an issue

2. You want to do it for a living. Treat it like a business and you are an employee, then decide how much your time is worth.

That's pretty much it. I think the confusion comes from having a passion to work on games with or without getting paid, and then because it's your own project you don't feel like you should be paying yourself, especially when you enjoy doing it in your spare time.

But I think the ultimate goal of any passionate game dev is to get paid to do what you love. That way you can focus full time on doing what you love and still be able to afford the other stuff like having a bed to sleep in and food to eat.

So while it may seem "steep" asking for 5-6 figures... you have to consider how much you need to earn each month to afford your bills/expenses, and how long the game is going to take to develop to completion.