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Last edited, March, 11, 2008

BEFORE YOU READ THESE ARE ONLY TIPS FOR THE BEGINNING OF YOUR COMPANY. AND DONT GET UPSET IF I LEFT SOMETHING OUT JUST POST IT IN THE THREAD AND ILL GLADLY ADD I,T Thanks

Whats Up Everyone its [/b]Punk13 Here With some tips on Starting
Your Very Own Game [/b]Company

Courtisy of pystire

I suggest that before you try to make a company, you try to take the indie route.

If you suck at everything but making up game ideas, then you can turn that into your Fortune 500. Come up with the BEST game idea you can (Completely YOUR idea, I might add), grab a copyright for it (a legal one, don't just throw copyright on there... big companies know ways around that), and pitch it to some serious Game Dev companies. If they like the idea, they just might buy the rights for it from you. (This was the reasoning behind getting a legal copyright) This way of income isn't the best, and before trying to do this, I would talk about it with your friends, fellow gamers, and a lot of other people to make sure that what you came up with is a commercial quality idea, one worth selling.

There are lots of ways to get noticed. Each individual skill needed for a game can be turned into a money making opportunity. Free-lancing is a great way for artists, especially making model packs, sprite packs, etc.


About the web hosting thing. If you want a GOOD website, then you'll want to learn some server-side programming and also hook up with a web host who can provide functionality for PHP, ASP, SSI, etc. Also, for a company, you'll want your own email domain as well.


Like Most of you iv dreamed of starting my own Game Company. And My dream is coming true in 1 month max my company will be up and Running.


So i Have decided to write a thread giving all of you some very
Useful tips


Ok lets start off at the Beginning.Your Googling up some things and you Run across this thing called FPSC, you think the program looks cool so you download the trial. Your so impressed that you decide to buy it. As you check out you discover The Game Creators Website
and you look at all the 3rd party software they offer and then join the forums and you start communicating with thousands of people like yourself.

Now your inspired to start your first Big project and you want to assemble a team and start a company. Here are some steps that will Help you.

[/b]Company Name

Think of a Unique name and make sure its not taken. Also make sure the name is available for a Website Domian. You will also need to purchase a business license through your county/ state. and a tax id number

[/b]Logo

Now You need a Logo. Unless your a Great artist or have a lot of money to pay for an Artist to design your logo your pretty restricted. But not to worry their is a great site that allows you to make a logo with ease and for [/b]Free The Link is

http://cooltext.com

[/b]Website

Now you need a site to promote your New Game(s)
I Prefer

http://hostica.com

next 2 website hoster courtesy of Mr. makelotsofsmoke


www.unlhosting.com <-- Free and if u send a Support ticket with your TCG forum name in it u get ad free.

www.sycohost.com <-- My new and still under construction paid web hosting. Cheapest plan is $2.45AUD for 500mb Space and 3gig Bandwidth with professional features. I will also be offering .com's for $11.95AUD

They Have a plan for only a $1 a month and they bill you only every 3 months.
Plus their domains are only $8 to $10 a year.

[/b]Studio

Now you need a studio. Remember you don't need a Giant corporate office to produce successful products. I Bet most people on these forums make great games from their own houses.
But I prefer an Office. If you look on craigslist you can find one for a very reasonable price like mine. I pay $350 a month for an office that has a Printing room, a Conference room and of course my own little office.

[/b]Team

Now you need to assemble a team. Unfortunately i have my friends helping me i use the word helping very (loosely)because they know sqot about game creation all they do is write up ideas and expect me to program it all. and they expect me to have choppers flying over your head, giant explosions, graphical cg cut scenes ect...

Hopefully you have friends that know a thing or two. You should assemble a Scripter, Writer, Modeler, and artist.
If their your friends and your low on cash im sure instead of getting paid by hour they would be fine with receiving royaltys
from the finished game. But if you need a team but dont want your friends involved you can always post a Help wanted ad on

http://gamedev.net

[/b]Software and engines

Now lets say FPSC isn't right for you not to worry their are many other programs that do the job like

Unreal engine- a program used to make beautiful games very pricey

Torque game engine- a good engine used for professionals

XNA- a game creation software made by Microsoft, and you can also put your games on the 360

Darkbasic- i'm not a programmer so im not very familiar with it

The 3d game Maker- its cheap and you can make 3d arcade style game with up to 20 levels

FPSC- Great program and worth the money and you could go commercial with it.

FPSC X10- Great Program with nex gen graphics.

Rpg maker- a cool 2d game maker with a big community

what... why am i naming all of these, here is a GREAT website


http://www.ambrosine.com/resource.html

[/b]Cutscenes

Cutscenes where the thing that held me back for the longest time, until i found this Program. believe me its worth the money

http://www.reallusion.com/iclone/

[/b]Models and Media

Ok model packs will save you from having a boring game.
you can purchase them from the
FPSC website or from people on the forum
All the models and segments made by
Bond1, John Fletcher, Steve and Luke314pi
Are Golden

Also try

http://arteria-gaming.com/index.html
Its a little pricey but worth it

if you wanted to make them yourselves you should use

Milkshape

Blender

Maya
XSI mod tool

Magic fps

entity workshop
ect..

[/b]Game Protection

I think Phoenix protection is a great program to use to protect your games.

[/b]Extras

search on the forums for these great programs

Lemur 2

and

EFXMOD
----------

Ok I hope this helps all of you and that your company Dream comes true. Please comment if i forgot any important links/ aspects.
I hope you all find this useful

ThanX
Punk13 [b]

I think there is more things you need to do before starting your own company. Here in sweden we have to pay $150 just to use our company name. There is a lot of money involved when starting up a company. Just think of that.

Otherwise, great tutorial or what it is.

Thanks i forgot to mention the business license

punk13

also you have a few spelling errors like ENsemble it should be assemble and it's dOmain no Damian

also in the modeling stuff put in XSI mod tool

This is just stating the obvious. And I hardly think the name is the most important thing. That should come last. And most FPSC team work is done online. We don't need an office unless we're planning on getting our projects on the front shelf in game. Lastly, FPSC is a drag-and-drop program. Whatever games stand out enough to be sold don't need corporate backing. It's more about knowing people (like indie publishers) and communicating your ideas to them, etc. Just remember that a game made by an actual company would use a better engine than FPSC.

I appreciate the advice. It's good that you took the time. But right now, it seems like you're just another one of us preaching gospel about game companies and FPSC. If I am proved wrong someday, I'll happily change my tune.

I know it's a fun idea, but perhaps it would be a better idea to have a game or two ready to sell, if not already selling before you take the "Company" plunge.

Best.

And lay off the bold type...it's irritating and it's bad forum manners.Things like that are to be used sparingly and when you post most of your post in bold most people are just going to skip it since they are annoyed.

What's with the surge of wannabe-sticky topics? I don't mean to slag you at all here, it's just you don't currently have any company experience except planning...and so apart from stating the obvious, you're not much better to listen to than a dreamer.

Also:

I disagree. It's almost the same as stock media, everyone has access to it (with the help of a little money), and no effort goes into making it part of your game. Fancy decor doesn't prevent your story or level design skills sucking either.

Paul

You can get any domain you want through Microsoft. I'm not sure if it lasts forever, mine has lasted a while.

Link to free .com/.net/.org/etc. domains

EDIT: And lay off of him a bit, he's just trying to help. I get crap every time I try do do something like this, he just needs to improve a bit. Otherwise, good guide, over-all.

Good tips there. I can offer some advice before company setup.

Create one level for a few different game types If you have friends/relatives who are gamers, get them to play test. If your levels pass this then ask them if they know people who are gamers who do not know you. Get them to play test. This is a good way to see if you have a product (and the ability to create that product) thats worth selling.

In the U.S. you need to fill out some paperwork to start a company, and don't forget taxes.

Don't know if this was said...but Halo wasn't made with Unreal...was it?

Don't think so...

Whats up ok i edited the post for spelling errors and added XSI mod
tool. Sorry FredP i only meant to bold the titles of the paragraphs anyway i fixed it
and xplosys is right when he says and thanks MeZoFoRtE. Im only trying to help
ThanX
Punk13

that helped some, but the first thing you need is the money to do it. Also, i tryed that benner/text generator and my sig has an example before you use it.

also u might wanna try and look at my web hosts

www.unlhosting.com <-- Free and if u send a Support ticket with your TCG forum name in it u get ad free.

www.sycohost.com <-- My new and still under construction paid web hosting. Cheapest plan is $2.45AUD for 500mb Space and 3gig Bandwidth with professional features. I will also be offering .com's for $11.95AUD

Well screw around with the text generator the one you used was the animated one. and Mr Makealotofsmoke ill add those to the list

I already own a company... it's not a big deal.

Sure, people dream of owning a company, and until you actually do, it may seem like that would be the only way to make it big. Truth be told... it isn't.

My company wasn't designed around the thought of selling commercial games, though. We make computers that play those games. (Or, at least, we WILL make computers, lol. Prototyping is tough business.)


I suggest that before you try to make a company, you try to take the indie route.

If you suck at everything but making up game ideas, then you can turn that into your Fortune 500. Come up with the BEST game idea you can (Completely YOUR idea, I might add), grab a copyright for it (a legal one, don't just throw copyright on there... big companies know ways around that), and pitch it to some serious Game Dev companies. If they like the idea, they just might buy the rights for it from you. (This was the reasoning behind getting a legal copyright) This way of income isn't the best, and before trying to do this, I would talk about it with your friends, fellow gamers, and a lot of other people to make sure that what you came up with is a commercial quality idea, one worth selling.

There are lots of ways to get noticed. Each individual skill needed for a game can be turned into a money making opportunity. Free-lancing is a great way for artists, especially making model packs, sprite packs, etc.


About the web hosting thing. If you want a GOOD website, then you'll want to learn some server-side programming and also hook up with a web host who can provide functionality for PHP, ASP, SSI, etc. Also, for a company, you'll want your own email domain as well.


The one and only,
~PlystirE~

yer, for starters maybe use Wordpress or joomla until you get a bigger fan base and more popular games, then get a professional or semi-pro website, maybe paid for made by yourself.

Wordpress and joomla are easy to install if your host has a good control panel like sycohost (*hint hint*) ROFL