An “auteur” is commonly defined as someone whose aesthetic, style, and degree of control makes each of their projects utterly unique and unquestionably “theirs.” Readers might think of Hideo Kojima, Suda51 or today’s subject, Hidetaka Suehiro, also known as SWERY or Swery65. SWERY’s newest project is The Good Life, described by its creators White Owls and G-rounding as a “debt repayment daily life RPG” and currently up for funding on Kickstarter. As such, I’d like to take it apart and see what makes it tick in today’s Crowdfunding Spotlight. The first thing to say about this idiosyncratic project is that it’s not just SWERY’s baby. Co-helming development is former Sega luminary Yukio Futatsugi, who eagle-eyed readers might recognize as the mastermind behind Panzer Dragoon and Phantom Dust (as the Kickstarter page reminds us). From a personal perspective, this makes me pretty excited from the outset, as I’m one of the seven people around the world who bought (and still very smugly owns) an English copy of the original Sega Saturn Panzer Dragoon Saga. That said, The Good Life already failed on Fig when it was originally pitched, so it’s all to play for (although the current Kickstarter pitch is a lot “cleaner” than the Fig pitch and seems to have more of a clear idea of what it wants to be). Let’s have a look at what The Good Life promises and whether it will live up to the absurdly high standards of its pedigree. Story-wise, players will take control of Naomi,… [Read full story]