I am wondering if I need to trademark my game name before pubicly announce it. From what I heard, you can only put the "TM" mark beside your game name to tell it is an "unregistered trade mark", but is it enough to protect yourself from theft ? Also how can I verify if my game name is not infringing a trademark somewhere (especially the unregistered ones which by defintion are not registered anywhere). A quick google search doesn't show up anything, neither does the US Patent & trademark office.

Thanks,

1. I am wondering if I need to trademark my game name before pubicly announce it.
2. From what I heard, you can only put the "TM" mark beside your game name to tell it is an "unregistered trade mark", but is it enough to protect yourself from theft ?
3. Also how can I verify if my game name is not infringing a trademark somewhere (especially the unregistered ones which by defintion are not registered anywhere). A quick google search doesn't show up anything, neither does the US Patent & trademark office.

1. No.
2. No. Nothing is "enough." All you can do is register your copyright and your trademark, then when somebody steals your work, you have good legal grounds to take them to court.
3. You pay an attorney to do a trademark search for you. You can't do it with a few minutes of Googling.

Yeah, trademarking your game name isn't something to worry about now. If your game makes enough money that you'd be willing to hire a lawyer to protect it, then you can do so. Until then, don't sweat it