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"It�s just you and your opponent at the board and you're trying to prove something" (Bobby Fischer)
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I was wondering, now that i have a backer & am being turned into a professional operation, what if someone sends me their game to be reviewed? Looked at?
What would be the best policy? Not to accept any unsolicited games? (I take it that means through an agent?). To look at the game with the understanding that they cannot try & sue me?
A couple people have said they'l send me their games. Should i return them unopened? I cant see why; i know people wont rip you off, but they might not.
By the way, any one want want their games play tested?
Colin
Colin, put a policy in place you don't take unsolicited designs. I mean that people aren't supposed to send you designs unless they first contact you. This way you can avoid potential lawsuits and so on.
Did the person happen to contact you first to look at or send it to you? If people want you to review a design first, they should contact you. Actually, send it back and have them get in touch with this forum here :-). They should post about their design and so on.
Best thing to do is get in contact with the person who sent it to you, and then ask them what is going on here. I think now IAGO should work out some standardized agreement statements so people get credited properly and are allowed to playtest their designs, and find people to playtest their games. IAGO can serve as a way to prevent people from getting mucked up by the marketplace so they get properly credited, and eventually compensated.
Colin, when you say, "now that i have a backer & am being turned into a professional operation" does this mean that you are publishing games and that people are sending games to you to get published?
If you are then get a policy in place that will help protect you from frivolous law suites. The problem stems from the following scenario.
Without prior contact Joe sends you a pirate game that they think is the most original game ever and he expect to get rich off from it because 3 people in the history of game design struck it rich.
You look at it and not only is it not something you would publish because it was not well thought out, you already have a pirate game you have been working on for the last 6 months due to come out in the summer so you turn it down.
You publish your pirate game and within the first month get a letter from Joe’s attorney. You are about to be sued for IP theft. You talk to your lawyer and Joe doesn’t have a leg to stand on. Even though you win in court the costs is high and almost all the profit ends up in the lawyers pocket instead of yours were it belongs.
The morel of the story is two fold.
Don’t take unsolicited prototypes.
Have the submitters sign an agreement not to sue you. (This is how to spend you money on a lawyer) you’ll see allot of companies use this sort of agreement.
This might sound unfriendly but you have to protect yourself.
Let me know when you are ready to accept submissions and I’ll sign the form and send you something.
Dralius wrote: "Without prior contact Joe sends you a pirate game..."
Joe Joyce?
LOL! Dralius, you been reading my notes? I have this really neat Pirates and Merchants game that just needs a little more work, but I know it'll make *millions*! Shinermons, I've just sent you all my notes - you finish it and we split the profit!!!
Hey, Mark, it's gotta be me; I mean, how many other Joes are there? ;-)
The strange thing is that I really am working on a pirates and merchants game, but it needs a fair bit more work before I start to look at whether I can pare down the components enough to produce some copies. Don't worry, shinermons, I'm not ready to consider splitting my "millions" with anyone else at this particular time. And the very best to you.
Joe
joejoyce, make it Pirates and Emperors and I will get more interested. Well, I know Pirates and Emperors are the same thing, but still :-)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tmG4Aqg0Mw
After seeing that, I wanted to do a game called "Pirates and Emperors".
All characters or games appearing in my previous example are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons or games, living, dead or OOP, is purely coincidental.
But to be Serious Joe, 5-8% of the sale price (not SRP) is the normal royalties for a designer. This can be higher or lower depending on the particulars of the contract but the company gets the bulk of the money from the sales because they are the ones taking the financial risks.
Eventually a designer has to go about taking risks on their own and self-publish. Without a track record, this is pretty difficult. Actually, a lot of designers do try to go this route. In the area of abstract strategy games, it is particularly tricky, since such games don't normally have a "hook" to them. Of course, if the environment is ripe, they have a shot. IAGO does manage to provide a hook for abstract strategy games.
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