"Q: What if I send my Game Design to a development company? Will they pay me for my idea? How do I make sure they don"t just steal it and use it in their next game? A: Most companies shred unsolicited, externally written design documents without reading them, so while you can be assured they won"t steal your ideas, you can be equally assured they aren"t going to pay you for them. If you want your game to get made, you will either have to develop it yourself (alone or with a team) or work your way into the industry and propose it then." What never!? - there is no way to get a new idea into the market without being inside the industry!!!???

Unless you''re already rich and famous. Otherwise, if you want your idea made, you''ll pretty much have to do it yourself.

if they read and unsolicited idea that was mailed to them, and they are already working on a similar game, they have to worry about the designer suing them. it is better from their point of view to not read them; even if they miss a great one, they still have plenty of ideas in-company.

I have seen some such companies have disclaimers saying that not only will they not read it, but any ideas that you do send them anyway, become their property and 'their idea'.

[edited by - botman2 on March 7, 2004 10:43:43 AM]

Oh, but there is mention of companies on this website I think, or perhaps it was Gamesultra, whos only job is to write game design documents, and then I assume, sell them to companies, or perhaps companies go to them I don''t know.

But maybe talk to them about selling game ideas.

yah i''ve seen a few of those, but i have no idea if they make any money or if they are just a website a bunch of kids made hoping to get rich quick. i assume they don''t do any actual business, unless their daddy''s are rich or they know some inside people at game companies.

I thought ideas couldn''t be copywrited, only implementations. Or does that apply to something else?

that''s true, but it''d have to go to court which wastes everybody''s time and money because of that "derivative works" clause. you''d have to try and prove they read your full design and then copied stuff from it, and they''d have to try and prove they didn''t read your stuff until after they wrote something very similar. a big mess for them, what with bad publicity and attourney fees and wasted time, even if they win.

it is much easier and safer to just not accept unsolicited designs from anyone. seriously, game companies are not hurting for ideas.

There are far more ideas than there are game development companies able to make them so companies don't really need new ideas from an unproven source. This is a very frequently asked question and a full answer can be found at http://www.obscure.co.uk/faq_idea.shtml

Dan Marchant
Obscure Productions (www.obscure.co.uk)
Game Development & Design consultant

[edited by - obscure on March 8, 2004 7:30:40 AM]

quote:

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Original post by botman2
Oh, but there is mention of companies on this website I think, or perhaps it was Gamesultra, whos only job is to write game design documents, and then I assume, sell them to companies, or perhaps companies go to them I don''t know.

But maybe talk to them about selling game ideas.

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There are reputable consultants around who offer their experience for sale. Usually, these are industry veterans who get hired by smaller developers and publishers who don''t have a suitably experienced member of staff.

E.g. If a start-up developer wants to get its project seen by a publisher, it can either make an educated guess as to what a publisher would like to see in a demo, or it can save itself a fair bit of trouble and expense by hiring a consultant who _knows_ what the publisher wants.

There are also design consultants who rely on an excellent track record of hits to get work with publishers and developers. It''s not unknown for such a consultant to give a submitted demo the green light, although most such consultants generally prefer to work with developers.

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Sean Timarco Baggaley