any time when sobody presents an idea to a company and the company takes it the person somtimes gets scrwed . but I have 2 realllly good game ideas, all throughly thought out and I really think that it could make some money too. I am in the process of reading some game graphics books but by the time I truly understand them to be able to make my own game i''ll be too old. so have any of u submitted a game design and or idea and the business side of it turned out okay?

No company will take your idea and give you wads of cash for it. That''s just a given, so don''t bother.

Orion

"Absorb what is useful, discard what is not, add what is uniquely your own."
-BRUCE LEE

When people want to give Disney ideas for stories, they have to talk to them with a lawyer. I''m guessing that''s how it would work with other big companies. There''s a lot of people who think they have good ideas for games, and game companies don''t have time to listen to them all.

Fact #1: There are 5-6 billion people on Earth.
Fact #2: Roughly 98-99% of these are fully capable of coming up with plots.
Fact #3: Companies don't have the time nor the money to buy these ideas. They don't give a flying fsck.

If you want your idea to make it out in public, you have two alternatives.

1: Do it yourself.
2: Work your way up in a game dev company until you become project manager.

"Sell it to them" is, sadly, not an option...

[edited by - RuneLancer on May 2, 2004 12:41:13 AM]

quote: Original post by RuneLancer
Fact #3: Companies don''t have the time nor the money to buy these ideas. They don''t give a flying fsck.

File system checks fly???

quote: Original post by illadel3life82
any time when sobody presents an idea to a company and the company takes it the person somtimes gets scrwed . but I have 2 realllly good game ideas, all throughly thought out and I really think that it could make some money too. I am in the process of reading some game graphics books but by the time I truly understand them to be able to make my own game i''ll be too old. so have any of u submitted a game design and or idea and the business side of it turned out okay?

I submitted 3 major ideas when I worked in the game industry, but unfortunately none were accepted. The company I worked for at one point was receiving about 3 to 5 submissions a day and had one guy devoted part time to cranking out the rejection letters.

I watched an associate, also in the industry, go through the process of submitting an idea from paper all the way to complete product. He ended up having to do most of the promotion and programming himself (and said he hated his own game toward the end because of working on it so much).

A second game company I worked for shopped around a really nice medieval RPG but at the time hit the market glut of RPGs when they were first bouncing back some years ago. They worked hard to shop it around to alot of different publishers, but couldn''t get buy in.


So, some constructive criticism for you?

First, work on your presentation. Don''t give anyone any reason, here online or elsewhere, to believe that you cannot communicate effectively (so no posts missing capitalization or with lots of Internet shorthand, and poor spelling). Even if you''re among friends, avoid being sloppy just to keep up the practice in writing skills.

Second, what you want to be able to do is get from a well written design document to at least a prototype stage. If you can''t do the artwork or programming yourself you''re going to need to become good enough at communicating with others to inspire them with the strength of your vision. I''ve seen projects greenlighted over lunch among enthusiastic peers.

Lastly, don''t worry about your ideas becoming too old or becoming too old yourself. Dispair murders imagination. If the times change, change your ideas with them. For example, imagine your idea done with future technology. I myself was recently looking at the possibility of never being able to do the games I''m interested in, and like you this made me discouraged. But I hit on the idea of imagining my designs done a voice only interface, technology that''s not really feasible right now. Practical or not, it cheered me up, and that was enough to keep me making decisions that may help get my games done.

So good luck, and don''t give up. And don''t fall into the trap of thinking that it''s going to be easy.

--------------------
Just waiting for the mothership...

As Wavinator made clear it is really hard to get an idea accepted even when you are in the industry/have experience. There are more ideas than any company could ever hope to make.

If you don't have industry experience and are not in the industry the chances of getting someone to buy (or even look at) your idea are zero. I did acquistions for a major European publisher. We didn't except such ideas and none of the people doing the job at other publishers did either.

For a full explanation as to why see http://www.obscure.co.uk/faq_idea.shtml

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

[edited by - obscure on May 3, 2004 10:38:50 AM]