[OT] Copyrighting games?

[Rick Harrison]

Hi Richmond,

When trying to get your cost estimates from the manufacturer just use
the same tile example you showed us.  They only need to know how
many pieces they are producing, and as to how difficult the pieces might
be to produce using how many colors etc.  Don’t give them any specifics
which would give away your game idea all together.

A hardware game is much more expensive and difficult to produce.
If I were you I do the software version first, and if it takes off then
produce the hardware version.  That’s what “Angry Birds” did.

You should be able to produce a hardware version prototype on
your own.  If you really need someone to do it for you, break up
the pieces if they are very different from each other and farm
each piece out to a different producer so that no one gets the
whole picture of what you are doing.  Don’t show them the rules etc.

One of the big problems working with a manufacturer is their
requirements that you order a minimum number of items,
(usually in the thousands of items) to make it worth their
while to produce what you want.  Of course that also
costs thousands of dollars as well.

Copyright is relatively easy.  Patents are not.

Cheers,

Rick