“Follow the fun”: a crowdfunding Q&A with Catino Town

In this interview with Alex Tino, read about their experience crowdfunding Catino Town, working in Unity for the first time, and how they’re approaching marketing Catino Town on Steam.

When layoffs hit during the pandemic, artist and animator Alex Tino decided it was their time to try going independent. Things kicked off when they posted an animation on TikTok of blobby cat-like creatures causing chaos around a dog trying to sleep. Alex called the creatures Catinos, and didn’t expect anything to come of the post, assuming people would find it too weird. Within a couple of hours, the first Catino World video amassed over a million views.

Today, Catino World is a thriving brand with plushies, stickers, and a loyal audience. Alex is currently working with programmer Thomas Cossu on turning Catino World into a game: Catino Town. Catino Town is a cozy virtual pet game built in Unity where you raise a Catino into one of 150 different forms, explore multiple locations, interact with other Catinos, collect items, and discover secrets.

Alex’s current goal is to launch Catino Town on Steam in 2027. To get the project over the finish line, they recently ran a $25,000 crowdfunding campaign that blew past its goal in under 12 hours, raising $75,000. We interviewed Alex to learn more about their experience crowdfunding Catino Town, and their upcoming plans for the game.

Interview responses have been edited for length and clarity. Alex Tino's advice is based on their own anecdotal experience and is not financial advice.

Key considerations for crowdfunding a video game

• Consider showing something tangible: a vertical slice at minimum, ideally a demo.
• Set the smallest funding goal you can truly deliver on, including paying collaborators.
• Build channels you own, like Discord and a newsletter.
• Expect most backers to be from your existing audience (Alex estimates around 80–90% of project backers were followers of Catino World on social media), and market your campaign yourself.
• Budget your campaign rewards carefully, and start merch small.

How did you decide on crowdfunding over other funding options?

Kickstarter was honestly my first option. I did consider reaching out to publishers, but I liked the idea of retaining full control over all the aspects of the project and just being independent with it. I'm sure there are publishers who would give me lots of creative freedom, but a big part of it was that I had an established audience. Not everyone has that, so for me crowdfunding just seemed like the best approach.

How long did it take to prepare, and what did you need ready?

It's so much more work than I thought it was going to be! [laughs] From deciding to seriously do it to launch was about a year: roughly six months planning, and six more on marketing and finishing touches, on top of my regular content work. There's the art, the pitch, the merch logistics and budgeting, and the marketing. I also had to make trailers, because up until then I'd only done devlogs for Catino Town. If you’re thinking about launching a crowdfunding campaign for your game, give yourself at least a couple of months of planning.

What state was Catino Town in when you launched your campaign?

It was in a vertical slice state. You want it to look good, at least to an extent. You can fake it a bit: creators I've talked to showed animations of how the finished game will look, and that's fair in my opinion. But most had demos, and I think one would have helped my campaign in retrospect. A Steam demo gets your wishlists up from the start and lets people imagine themselves playing. Something tangible like that always goes a lot farther than a pitch or a concept.

How did you pick your funding goal?

I went for the number I thought was the smallest I could actually finish Catino Town with. You have to think about what you need to pay other people, pay yourself, and invest in. In that respect, it's a bit of a gamble. You don't know how well it will do, even with lots of people pre-saving.

Stretch goals are useful for the higher number you hope to hit, and you keep the base amount either way. You just don't want to go so small that you're taking people's money and you're not able to actually finish anything.

Where did your backers come from?

In the backer survey, I asked how people found us. Very roughly, 80 to 90 percent were existing fans. The rest found me through social media posts about the campaign, not through the platform itself. We trended in the video game category for most of the campaign, in the top six. Generally, though, direct discovery on these platforms is pretty low, so I’d say you still have to put in the work to market yourself on social media.

I've heard that it's best to wait until you have around a thousand saves or wishlists before launching, because that first day is so essential. Don't be afraid to promote for a month or a few months first, so you're ready when the hype builds. I posted about Catino Town daily during the campaign, which I’m not sure I’d recommend – it’s a lot of work, so watch for burnout.

How did you design your reward tiers, and what should first-timers know about merch?

Merch has been the main way I've funded myself through Catino World, so that informed a lot. I thought about what people had really liked buying before. Plushies are probably my biggest thing, so I knew I should include one.

But plushies are more expensive and the manufacturing is more involved, so I went back and forth. For a while I wasn't going to do one, so I made a lot of other trinkets. Then near the end I decided to include it and didn't revise the rest. In hindsight, it might have been best to limit some of these rewards, but at least the fans got cool stuff! My merch experience meant there were no surprises on budgeting, but if you're new, things can cost more than you think. I also really thought you had to woo backers with as much merch as possible, but most just seemed like they wanted to support the idea, which was nice to see.

My advice is to think of some cool rewards, but don't go overboard. If you're new to merch, start small and go up incrementally. Stickers are cheap and easy to order, and print-on-demand means you're not making a pile of things that just sit there. Plushies are a lot to take on, and companies that help usually take a large cut. I've ordered too much of something before, and other creators have too. If you have an audience, put up a poll and ask which designs they like.

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How did you design your reward tiers, and what should first-timers know about merch?

Merch has been the main way I've funded myself through Catino World, so that informed a lot. I thought about what people had really liked buying before. Plushies are probably my biggest thing, so I knew I should include one.

But plushies are more expensive and the manufacturing is more involved, so I went back and forth. For a while I wasn't going to do one, so I made a lot of other trinkets. Then near the end I decided to include it and didn't revise the rest. In hindsight, it might have been best to limit some of these rewards, but at least the fans got cool stuff! My merch experience meant there were no surprises on budgeting, but if you're new, things can cost more than you think. I also really thought you had to woo backers with as much merch as possible, but most just seemed like they wanted to support the idea, which was nice to see.

My advice is to think of some cool rewards, but don't go overboard. If you're new to merch, start small and go up incrementally. Stickers are cheap and easy to order, and print-on-demand means you're not making a pile of things that just sit there. Plushies are a lot to take on, and companies that help usually take a large cut. I've ordered too much of something before, and other creators have too. If you have an audience, put up a poll and ask which designs they like.

You work in Unity through custom tools. How does that work day to day?

This is my first time using Unity, so I've been learning as I go. My programmer built an interface for adding new Catino evolutions. For example, if I draw a new squirrel Catino, I drag in the images, there's a bit of setup I've learned, and it makes adding evolutions much easier, so we can have a lot more of them. My files are organized a certain way, so the tool reads them and outputs the result. Some designs, like ones with flapping wings, need manual tweaks, but most of the time I can just plop in some art and the tool knows how to read each frame of animation.

How did you scope the art for 150+ Catino forms?

I built the game to be light on animation frames, because I knew I'd have to make so many, and for a long time I was the only artist working on Catino Town. I found a system that repurposes the same sprites to get a variety of movements. It took some thinking at the start but really paid off, and because it's 2D there's far less processing than in a 3D game.

How did you approach bringing Catino Town to both mobile and PC?

My first thought was that virtual pets work really well when you can take them on the go. A lot of that was naivety [laughs], since I'd never made a game and hadn't researched the business side. What made it manageable is that I never designed it as a modern mobile game with microtransactions or ads. I wanted you to buy it and own it, so the game loop was never built around short sessions and waiting. Because it's also 2D and light on animation frames, the same ideas worked across platforms. We're planning for both, and we'd love to offer cross-save, though we're not 100% sure we can.

How are you building wishlists and buzz for Catino Town?

I'd say consistently talking about the game and having fun with the videos has been my main strategy! I've tried to really emphasize the ways that Catino Town is about having fun, rather than watching ads or “paying to win.” And if the game is about fun, I think the videos and posts I make should reflect that! One thing I've learned from doing social media is that people can tell when you love what you're doing – so I think if you follow the fun, you'll be on a good path!

When does crowdfunding make sense, and when doesn't it?

If you have the resources to put something together, I’d say it’s worth trying. A demo can really help, but honestly, we're in a time when people just want to see passion, they want to see human-made projects. If you have an idea you're passionate about, it's pretty much a risk-free way to get the resources to make something you want to make. Especially if you have an existing audience, they probably want to help you.

And even if you don't have an audience, it's still worth it. You don't have to start with a campaign. Start talking about what you want to make, or just start making it, whether that's a prototype or artwork. I'm obviously a little biased [laughs] since my brand was successful beforehand, but I see it as a great way to bring a project to life that you might not be able to otherwise, and keep it independent and in your hands.

Add Catino Town to your wishlist and get notified when it launches on PC and mobile in 2027. Explore more Made with Unity games on our Steam Curator page, and check out more stories from Unity developers on the Unity Blog and Resource Hub.