Could anyone give some guidance?

A lawyer could.

A short answer is that nobody will be willing to work on a commercial game without a contract, no publisher will fund the game without a contract, no retail channel will distribute/sell the game without a contract...

As always, IANAL

Quote: Original post by swiftcoder
A short answer is that nobody will be willing to work on a commercial game without a contract, no publisher will fund the game without a contract, no retail channel will distribute/sell the game without a contract...

As always, IANAL

I'm working with someone who really feels that there is no point to it. I am the team leader and he is the programmer. This is for an iPhone app. Although he seems to have reluctantly accepted, I'm still confused as to why he may feel it was unnecessary.

Well, just don't pay him and then claim you never said you would :-) He'll soon start to understand...

Quote: Original post by PolyVox
Well, just don't pay him and then claim you never said you would :-) He'll soon start to understand...

I would never do that. That's just an asshole thing to do. :(

Quote: Original post by ZenDavis

Quote: Original post by PolyVox
Well, just don't pay him and then claim you never said you would :-) He'll soon start to understand...

I would never do that. That's just an asshole thing to do. :(

Sure, but PolyVox is correct - that is the reason for contracts. Without a contract, you have no guarantee that he will complete the work, and he has no guarantee that you will pay him.

Of course, even if you do have a contract, it can still be difficult to collect payment from a dodgy employer (i.e. you may have to go to court to enforce the contract)...

And if the two of you know each other, and are just doing something simple like a 50/50 split of income on an iPhone game, then you may both be willing to rely on a 'gentleman's agreement' (i.e. handshake). I wouldn't recommend it, but it is sometimes (perhaps even often) done on small projects [smile]

Quote: Original post by ZenDavis
I'm working with someone who really feels that there is no point to it. I am the team leader and he is the programmer. This is for an iPhone app. Although he seems to have reluctantly accepted, I'm still confused as to why he may feel it was unnecessary.

I would not want to work with someone who didn't understand this basic fact of game development. It's a good thing he's accepted. But I see a red flag already.

Unless he is an employee, you need a work for hire contract to establish your ownership of the code written by the programmer. Otherwise he retains the copyright and could prevent the sale of the game if there is a dispute later on down the road.

I'm the programmer Zen is referring to.

@ Tom Sloper

Quote: I would not want to work with someone who didn't understand this basic fact of game development. It's a good thing he's accepted. But I see a red flag already.

Good to know there is someone willing to make a judgment based on so little information...

This is independent game development, folks. No money has changed hands. The agreement is for a percentage of revenue. The target may be commercial (app store), but there are no companies involved here.

In my opinion, the nature of this kind of online team is that there are no guarantees. I'm a proponent of the "gentleman's agreement" mentioned by swiftcoder. If I have given my word on something, I will make it happen.

I would be willing to bet that many more projects like this are done based such an agreement than there are online indy teams drawing up contracts and signing NDAs.

Hopefully this has provided a little more information for the discussion. I definitely welcome further comments.