[ephemeralgomi]

I mean this in the nicest way: I'd just like to point out that before Kickstarter, pretty much your only option would have been to scrounge up the money yourselves, invest it along with your sweat, blood, tears, and time into making the game, and then release it only to find out that it doesn't resonate with your target audience. With Kickstarter, you're able to discover up front if what you're making isn't what people actually want, and save yourself the wasted effort.

There's only one bit of tangible advice I have for you - and I haven't ever run a successful Kickstarter, so take it with a grain of salt. I've worked in games, and I know that they always take way more time and effort than you expect, even with aggressive cutting/scoping. Whenever I see a game Kickstarter with a target this low, my estimation of its failure probability (even if it's overfunded!) is around 80-90%. It tells me that the people involved don't really know what they're getting into. The lowest game Kickstarter I ever backed was Radio the Universe with a target of $12k (but ended up bringing in $80k), and I fully expected it to fail.

[neltnerb]

I have run unsuccessful kickstarter campaigns, and I think think this is the least depressing way to think about it.

Kickstarter is a way to validate your business model for no money and minimal time. You've just tested your MVP, and the feedback is that it's not what your customers want.

This is pretty valuable, since hopefully by talking to the people who backed your game (and the people here who wouldn't) you'll have a much better chance of making something that is actually wanted later.