Abruptly

After raising nearly $340,000 on Kickstarter in a crowdfunding campaign that ended in June 2024, Studio Camelia, the developer of “a vibrant tribute to the golden age of JPRGs” called Alzara Radiant Echoes, has announced that it’s shutting down.

In a Kickstarter update (via Game Developer), Studio Camelia said that despite the success of the crowdfunding campaign, it’s been unable to secure further financing and thus cannot continue development.

“We started the studio with our personal savings and managed to convince business angels, banks, and institutions who believed in our vision and supported us,” the dev team wrote. “We were even honored to be accepted into Microsoft’s Developer Acceleration Program.

“With all this support, we had half the development of the game covered, and only needed to secure the other half through an industry partner. However, as you know, the videogame industry is currently going through a crisis. Many studios have been forced to close due to lack of funding, and over 20,000 workers have lost their jobs. Investors are now operating in a market where taking risks is discouraged, and they can afford to wait before committing to a project in order to reduce risk.”

Studio Camelia said it went to Kickstarter to help reduce that perceived risk by demonstrating the level of interest in the game, and the campaign was indeed a major success, pulling in nearly triple its €100,000 ($115,000) goal over a 31 day campaign and becoming one of the biggest videogame Kickstarters of 2024.

And that’s where things get a little hairy: Those funds were apparently used to develop a new demo for Alzara, which the studio showed to potential partners at various conferences—none of which resulted in a deal. With no prospect of further funding, the studio was formally liquidated on April 28, and Alzara Radiant Echoes is now “on an indefinite pause.”

There’s a “slim chance” Alzara might eventually see the light of day if a third party offers to take it over, Studio Camelia wrote, although that would mean the game “would inevitably take a different direction than what was presented during the campaign.” For now, though, Kickstarter backers are simply out of luck. There will be no refunds offered, because there is no money to pay for them—if there was, the project wouldn’t have to be cancelled.

ALZARA Radiant Echoes | Reveal trailer – YouTube

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Backers are, understandably, not happy. There are numerous angry complaints that the Kickstarter campaign said nothing about using the funds to develop a demo that would be used to secure even more funding, which as far as I can tell is accurate.

The only hint that the campaign was actually intended to facilitate further fundraising is a line in the FAQ saying the studio opted for Kickstarter “to showcase the demand for Alzara Radiant Echoes,” rather than to, y’know, make the game.

But the campaign also claimed that Studio Camelia had “meticulously planned every aspect of the game’s development to adhere to strict budgets and timelines,” strongly implying that those fundamentals were already in place.

There’s also clear upset among backers over the fact that the Kickstarter campaign raised triple its goal—these things aren’t linear but if you could do what needed to be done with €100K, you should be able to do it really easily with €300K, right?—and that there was no hint of possible problems or financial issues prior to the studio closure announcement. In fact, a February 2025 Kickstarter update indicates Studio Camelia was continuing to take “late pledges” until February 17, just a couple months before its closure and liquidation.

Some complained that they won’t even get to play the demo that was made with the Kickstarter funds: Studio Camelia released a “pre-production demo” video showing excerpts of demo gameplay but said the demo itself “cannot be shared publicly for copyright reasons, and the company’s liquidation prevents us from releasing any game content.”

ALZARA Radiant Echoes | Pre-production demo – YouTube

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“I’m honestly at a bit of a loss here,” one backer wrote. “I backed this project thinking it was for a complete game, and something that already seemed well along in development. But after reading the latest update and watching the video, I’m left confused. There’s no real demo to speak of, just disjointed snippets of gameplay. And to make matters worse, the gameplay quality is actually lower than what is shown in the GIFs used in the campaign, which now feel more like short animations with a UI layer on top.

“I would have expected significantly more progress after a year. From what was shown in the video, it seems like most of the assets were already in place during the campaign, with maybe a few minor additions. Honestly, it just doesn’t add up. It feels like the funding may have been used for things completely unrelated to what was promised, not even to build this demo, which we can’t see or play ourselves.”

It’s really not hard to understand where the anger is coming from. Alzara’s presentation looks fully formed and fleshed out with gameplay clips, animations, character details, and promised collaboration with composer Motoi Sakuraba and character artist Yoshiro Ambe. Nothing about it, as far as I can see—aside from that one little bit in the FAQ—points to this being anything beyond a straight-up “give us money so we can make our game.”

I’m pretty pro-Kickstarter overall: I’ve backed quite a few campaigns over the years, and thus far all but one have worked out. (Even the one that didn’t work out was released, it just really sucked.) But they are always a risk, even when they look like sure things, and the ugly failure of Alzara Radiant Echoes is a reminder we haven’t had for a while: Never put more into a Kickstarter than you can afford to lose without hurting, because there’s always a non-zero chance that you might just lose it all.

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If there’s one thing the Federal Bureau of Investigation does well, it’s mass surveillance. Several years ago, then attorney general William Barr established an internal office to curb the FBI’s abuse of one controversial surveillance law. But recently, the FBI’s long-time hater (and, ironically, current director) Kash Patel shut down the watchdog group with no explanation.

On Tuesday, the New York Times reported that Patel suddenly closed the Office of Internal Auditing that Barr created in 2020. The office’s leader, Cindy Hall, abruptly retired. People familiar with the matter told the outlet that the closure of the aforementioned watchdog group alongside the Office of Integrity and Compliance are part of internal reorganization. Sources also reportedly said that Hall was trying to expand the office’s work, but her attempts to onboard new employees were stopped by the Trump administration’s hiring freezes.

The Office of Internal Auditing was a response to controversy surrounding the FBI’s use of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The 2008 law primarily addresses surveillance of non-Americans abroad. However, Jeramie Scott, senior counselor at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, told Gizmodo via email that the FBI “has repeatedly abused its ability to search Americans’ communications ‘incidentally’ collected under Section 702” to conduct warrantless spying.

Patel has not released any official comment regarding his decision to close the office. But Elizabeth Goitein, senior director at the Brennan Center for Justice, told Gizmodo via email, “It is hard to square this move with Mr. Patel’s own stated concerns about the FBI’s use of Section 702.”

Last year, Congress reauthorized Section 702 despite mounting concerns over its misuses. Although Congress introduced some reforms, the updated legislation actually expanded the government’s surveillance capabilities. At the time, Patel slammed the law’s passage, stating that former FBI director Christopher Wray, who Patel once tried to sue, “was caught last year illegally using 702 collection methods against Americans 274,000 times.” (Per the New York Times, Patel is likely referencing a declassified 2023 opinion by the FISA court that used the Office of Internal Auditing’s findings to determine the FBI made 278,000 bad queries over several years.)

According to Goitein, the office has “played a key role in exposing FBI abuses of Section 702, including warrantless searches for the communication of members of Congress, judges, and protesters.” And ironically, Patel inadvertently drove its creation after attacking the FBI’s FISA applications to wiretap a former Trump campaign advisor in 2018 while investigating potential Russian election interference. Trump and his supporters used Patel’s attacks to push their own narrative dismissing any concerns. Last year, former representative Devin Nunes, who is now CEO of Truth Social, said Patel was “instrumental” to uncovering the “hoax and finding evidence of government malfeasance.”

Although Patel mostly peddled conspiracies, the Justice Department conducted a probe into the FBI’s investigation that raised concerns over “basic and fundamental errors” it committed. In response, Barr created the Office of Internal Auditing, stating, “What happened to the Trump presidential campaign and his subsequent Administration after the President was duly elected by the American people must never happen again.”

But since taking office, Patel has changed his tune about FISA. During his confirmation hearing, Patel referred to Section 702 as a “critical tool” and said, “I’m proud of the reforms that have been implemented and I’m proud to work with Congress moving forward to implement more.” However, reforms don’t mean much by themselves. As Goitein noted, “Without a separate office dedicated to surveillance compliance, [the FBI’s] abuses could go unreported and unchecked.”

An annual transparency report from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence shows that the FBI’s searches for Americans’ information has fallen. Last year, the FBI only used 5,518 query terms about Americans, compared to 57,094 in 2023 and 119,383 in 2022. While this looks like progress, it doesn’t mean that the Office of Internal Auditing’s work is done.

“The FBI should maintain its audits,” Scott said, “and if they do, the FBI must make very clear who is responsible for continuing the internal audits and ensure the oversight gets done.”

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Just 1 year after raising $340,000 on Kickstarter to make a ‘vibrant’ new JPRG, Studio Camelia abruptly closes

FBI Director Kash Patel Abruptly Closes Internal Watchdog Office Overseeing Surveillance Compliance