Mostly though people won't. Not unless it is an amazingly new and original idea and something that's easy to make quicker than you can finish it (which is doubtful).
I never see why people worry cos as soon as you release it to the appstore then others can copy the idea anyway. If I think about some of the best games (bumps, grisly manor, etc..) they all posted video and screenshots and info as they went along and no one copied them.
It's a slippery slope that ends in being as paranoid as photics :-) Just don't worry.
StusApps said: Mostly though people won't. Not unless it is an amazingly new and original idea and something that's easy to make quicker than you can finish it (which is doubtful).
I never see why people worry cos as soon as you release it to the appstore then others can copy the idea anyway. If I think about some of the best games (bumps, grisly manor, etc..) they all posted video and screenshots and info as they went along and no one copied them.
It's a slippery slope that ends in being as paranoid as photics :-) Just don't worry.
very true. Mostly your apps only would get stolen, if you show the ideas in the early stages. gives people enough time to make it before you. and if it is a truly amazing idea, it might get popular on the forums. therefore, they would look like an ass if they copied you. Don't worry man.
tenrdrmerMember, Sous Chef, Senior Sous-ChefPosts: 9,934
StusApps said: Mostly though people won't. Not unless it is an amazingly new and original idea and something that's easy to make quicker than you can finish it (which is doubtful).
I never see why people worry cos as soon as you release it to the appstore then others can copy the idea anyway. If I think about some of the best games (bumps, grisly manor, etc..) they all posted video and screenshots and info as they went along and no one copied them.
It's a slippery slope that ends in being as paranoid as photics :-) Just don't worry.
I guess im as paranoid as photics then. LOL The concern is once its on the store its your and if its copied then they look like a knock off not you. I'm actually in that boat. I just a had a game shown to me that is the same concept as one i've been working on for a few months. now I have to make it better and deal with the claim its a knockoff since its similar and I had never seen anything like it up to that point on the store.
I generally wont show my stuff publicly until its ready to submit. Also you better reserve your game name with apple if you are going to show it early since thats another way some pricks can screw you.
StusApps said: Mostly though people won't. Not unless it is an amazingly new and original idea and something that's easy to make quicker than you can finish it (which is doubtful).
I never see why people worry cos as soon as you release it to the appstore then others can copy the idea anyway. If I think about some of the best games (bumps, grisly manor, etc..) they all posted video and screenshots and info as they went along and no one copied them.
It's a slippery slope that ends in being as paranoid as photics :-) Just don't worry.
I found out yesterday that someone was planning on doing a black and white game, but they had the courtesy to ask me first. As I have a couple more Air Supply games in the pipeline, I was a bit peeved to be completely honest, and they're not pressing ahead.
Now I find out that someone has contacted the musician I used. Again, peeved, as I've spent over a year getting to know the guy, listening to his music and working out how to best fit it into a game. Now I have to give the musician a list of songs I'm planning to use, just so I don't clash with this other guy.
I'm sure there'll be a bunch of games with unlocks in them too.
I realise there's not a lot I can do about any of this, but this 'me too' attitude really saddens me.
quantumsheep said: I found out yesterday that someone was planning on doing a black and white game, but they had the courtesy to ask me first. As I have a couple more Air Supply games in the pipeline, I was a bit peeved to be completely honest, and they're not pressing ahead.
QS, I just wanted to follow up on something I noticed in your post; primarily because I love your work and have a great respect for your contributions.
Am I interpreting this correctly in that you believe you should have an exclusivity on black and white games? Outside of the fact that there are a ton of retro-style games from developers who grew up in that era in the App Store, I can't see that as what you are thinking (along with unlocks) but I really want to clarify that.
To be honest, I have been working on a game that is retro in nature and uses an off-black and white style using simple geometry and images since last November and I would really hate to think that once I put it out there that you would be upset that I have done so (and I have no plans to abandon 4+ months of work). If that will be the case, I would really like to chat with you outside of the forums as I had some ideas to experiment with cross-promote with other indie devs (you can talk to TSB as he is aware of it).
Anyways, I hope I am wrong about how I interpreted your post and, as I mentioned earlier, would love to chat externally of the forums if you have concerns in regards to what I am doing.
Let me try and clear things up as best I can without digging a hole for myself in your estimations!
I'm annoyed that people on these forums display a 'me too' nature. It's unfortunate. We have a great tool at our disposal, and yet people are constantly asking 'how do I make angry birds? How do I make an adventure game like Grisly Manor? How do I make a Tiny Wings game' etc etc
Now some of these people may have a real passion for these kinds of games. The majority, alas, I feel, do not.
I am tired of people putting in the minimum of effort to just try and make a quick buck. We've had a few examples just this last week of people publishing templates with little to no changes straight to the app store.
And it's disappointing to me, personally, to have certain aspects of a game copied in an attempt to cash in (which is what it looks like to me). How many people had heard of Mister Beep before Air Supply? And now someone's mailing him to use his tunes! Sometimes I feel that people ask about sales just to work out if it's an idea worth ripping off!
Normally, without GameSalad, it would take someone months to make a game. Now it can be done in a weekend (or in the case of the no-change template publishers, a few short hours). Even *with* GS, it takes me a long time to make my games.
So, no, I don't have exclusive rights to black and white graphics. That's absurd. But I bet at least a few games will have the unlockable colours in them now. And yes, it concerns me that these 'me too' games can take an idea from a game and turn it around in a weekend and publish it and try and piggy-back off the success of particular titles.
It dilutes the hard work of others I feel. But that's just me I guess.
You can obviously tell me where to go, and a few people will probably say 'that's reality - deal with it'. I obviously can't expect everyone to think like me!
I thinks it win win.....kinda....if they steal it that's a compliment...and if they score huge paid downloads...it will be easy for you to come after them later and demand payment and restitution. So keep good notes as you create your IP.
It's a tough call really. Whilst we were getting on with Super Stack Attack, we were getting a bit worried that there were seemingly lots of stacking games being published from Darren's template. As worrying as that felt, we still held off from publishing early and continued to work on the game and polish it up. And a few more staking games were released....and we still carried on working.
The upshot is, our game ended up being N&N....and none of the previous ones did, which proves the old "Creme floats to the top" analogy I guess.
But on the other hand......all those other people who had already published their stacking game before us, might be thinking, "look at these gits coming along after us and stealing our thunder".
I usually hold back from releasing many details of up-coming games to the web (even here), untill I know I'm only a week or 2 from finishing/publishing. But then again, I don't think I have ever come up with any kind of revolutionary idea for a new style of game or anything either.
"Just because you're paranoid, don't mean they're not out to get you!"
But in my situation... they are out to get me. All day long I can see evil-doers trying to hack or spam my website. People have illegally used my content too.
Here's a factoid... In about a year, the number of fake registrations at my website was 5352.
This community is pretty cool overall though. There is a certain respect among the top developers.
its kinda like the tiny wings. not many games had that style with texture. now a bunch do. not that many games had birds(angry birds) now a bunch do. I know how you feel, but I have never been in that spot with game making. I have with guitar though. I practiced my butt off playing guitar and my friend gets a (crappy) guitar and starts telling everyone about all this guitar stuff trying to show off when he cant play crap. he tries to learn the songs I learn and tells everyone that. hes a bragger. I am not. I have only told a handful of people I play guitar.
The same happened with Air Supply - I'd been working on it a few weeks and then Hachiko's template came out, then Darren's free one (you should have seen my face when I saw his '250 templates emailed' comment in that thread!) and the timing just seemed all wrong.
The game came out after a lot of other games made from his template - but I think you could see the difference between them (and indeed many many other running games).
Like you, I don't like to give out details till about 2 weeks from completion.
I don't know where I'm going with this - but just thought I'd agree with what you said from my side
Like you, I don't like to give out details till about 2 weeks from completion.
yup, same here. I'm a one man workshop here, it takes me a very long time to get stuff done. I know that if I showed the full gameplay of my app, someone could rip it off and publish it in a week or two. maybe not with 100 levels, but the damage would have been done.
I'm dying to show everyone what I have done so far, but I've only completed 62 levels so far. then I have to go back and put in all the dialog.
SlickZeroHouston, TexasMember, Sous ChefPosts: 2,870
quantumsheep said: Let me try and clear things up as best I can without digging a hole for myself in your estimations!
I'm annoyed that people on these forums display a 'me too' nature. It's unfortunate. We have a great tool at our disposal, and yet people are constantly asking 'how do I make angry birds? How do I make an adventure game like Grisly Manor? How do I make a Tiny Wings game' etc etc
Now some of these people may have a real passion for these kinds of games. The majority, alas, I feel, do not.
I am tired of people putting in the minimum of effort to just try and make a quick buck. We've had a few examples just this last week of people publishing templates with little to no changes straight to the app store.
And it's disappointing to me, personally, to have certain aspects of a game copied in an attempt to cash in (which is what it looks like to me). How many people had heard of Mister Beep before Air Supply? And now someone's mailing him to use his tunes! Sometimes I feel that people ask about sales just to work out if it's an idea worth ripping off!
Normally, without GameSalad, it would take someone months to make a game. Now it can be done in a weekend (or in the case of the no-change template publishers, a few short hours). Even *with* GS, it takes me a long time to make my games.
So, no, I don't have exclusive rights to black and white graphics. That's absurd. But I bet at least a few games will have the unlockable colours in them now. And yes, it concerns me that these 'me too' games can take an idea from a game and turn it around in a weekend and publish it and try and piggy-back off the success of particular titles.
It dilutes the hard work of others I feel. But that's just me I guess.
You can obviously tell me where to go, and a few people will probably say 'that's reality - deal with it'. I obviously can't expect everyone to think like me!
My original point was not really for the experienced developers here, who I am sure have all learned one way or the other what to reveal. It was for the new majority who mostly are lifting an idea from elsewhere, republishing templates (rather than making a new game from it) or just making the easiest thing they could work out how to do.
Personally I have had both game style/graphics and game ideas copied very obviously. I'm not bothered by this as in one case the result was a better game than my original. Perhaps I might be bothered if they had a similar name to mine and they were taking sales away from me. So far I have not seen this impact, in fact recently a released game that was extremely similar to one of mine and with a very similar name was released by a gamesalad member (and it is a great game they made). Once this came out it has boosted my sales by quite a bit.
I do agree when the games have really good and cool original ideas that people should be quite guarded in what they reveal early, particularly when that is a genre or visual style that's easy to replicate. However if it is a big game that others can't really copy easily (bumps, grisly manner) then I think it is great to see things people are working on and watch games evolve. It is always good motivation to see great games other people are developing.
I don't mean to continually bag on photics but adding to a development log for BOT every day that kinda tells us nothing and shows nothing because of a fear that people are going to steal it is a bit silly.
Photics said: All day long I can see evil-doers trying to hack or spam my website. People have illegally used my content too.
What is your Website Photics? I'm all out of ideas for new games and I get the feeling yours are the best ones to rip off!
I'm joking of course.
I think there's a fine line between being inspired by a game and copying it too much. GS means that the latter is all too easy, especially with the abundance of templates.
Personally, I have resisted the temptation to use anyone's template, only searching for solutions to coding issues I've had. I do look through the App Store and online games sites to help me generate ideas though.
I concur with most of you. I get a bit paranoid with who to Trust.
People I trust the most would be ofcourse Tshirt Booth, Ace, Slick Zero and a couple other people.... But really I get funny about sharing stuff, like those images I have on the forums at the moment. But I guess it's first in best dress, if the copy the game once it's out, who cares.. if people copy Angry Birds they won't make anywhere near as much. . . . ----------------------------------------------------- Join the GameSalad Community and have your game noticed for free. http://www.facebook.com/ListYourTopiPhoneGame List your Top iPhone Game on FaceBook!
Comments
I never see why people worry cos as soon as you release it to the appstore then others can copy the idea anyway. If I think about some of the best games (bumps, grisly manor, etc..) they all posted video and screenshots and info as they went along and no one copied them.
It's a slippery slope that ends in being as paranoid as photics :-) Just don't worry.
I generally wont show my stuff publicly until its ready to submit. Also you better reserve your game name with apple if you are going to show it early since thats another way some pricks can screw you.
Now I find out that someone has contacted the musician I used. Again, peeved, as I've spent over a year getting to know the guy, listening to his music and working out how to best fit it into a game. Now I have to give the musician a list of songs I'm planning to use, just so I don't clash with this other guy.
I'm sure there'll be a bunch of games with unlocks in them too.
I realise there's not a lot I can do about any of this, but this 'me too' attitude really saddens me.
/rant off
QS
Dr. Sam Beckett never returned home...
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Quantum_Sheep
Web: https://quantumsheep.itch.io
Am I interpreting this correctly in that you believe you should have an exclusivity on black and white games? Outside of the fact that there are a ton of retro-style games from developers who grew up in that era in the App Store, I can't see that as what you are thinking (along with unlocks) but I really want to clarify that.
To be honest, I have been working on a game that is retro in nature and uses an off-black and white style using simple geometry and images since last November and I would really hate to think that once I put it out there that you would be upset that I have done so (and I have no plans to abandon 4+ months of work). If that will be the case, I would really like to chat with you outside of the forums as I had some ideas to experiment with cross-promote with other indie devs (you can talk to TSB as he is aware of it).
Anyways, I hope I am wrong about how I interpreted your post and, as I mentioned earlier, would love to chat externally of the forums if you have concerns in regards to what I am doing.
Kind regards,
-R-
I'm annoyed that people on these forums display a 'me too' nature. It's unfortunate. We have a great tool at our disposal, and yet people are constantly asking 'how do I make angry birds? How do I make an adventure game like Grisly Manor? How do I make a Tiny Wings game' etc etc
Now some of these people may have a real passion for these kinds of games. The majority, alas, I feel, do not.
I am tired of people putting in the minimum of effort to just try and make a quick buck. We've had a few examples just this last week of people publishing templates with little to no changes straight to the app store.
And it's disappointing to me, personally, to have certain aspects of a game copied in an attempt to cash in (which is what it looks like to me). How many people had heard of Mister Beep before Air Supply? And now someone's mailing him to use his tunes! Sometimes I feel that people ask about sales just to work out if it's an idea worth ripping off!
Normally, without GameSalad, it would take someone months to make a game. Now it can be done in a weekend (or in the case of the no-change template publishers, a few short hours). Even *with* GS, it takes me a long time to make my games.
So, no, I don't have exclusive rights to black and white graphics. That's absurd. But I bet at least a few games will have the unlockable colours in them now. And yes, it concerns me that these 'me too' games can take an idea from a game and turn it around in a weekend and publish it and try and piggy-back off the success of particular titles.
It dilutes the hard work of others I feel. But that's just me I guess.
You can obviously tell me where to go, and a few people will probably say 'that's reality - deal with it'. I obviously can't expect everyone to think like me!
It doesn't mean I have to like it though!
QS
Dr. Sam Beckett never returned home...
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Quantum_Sheep
Web: https://quantumsheep.itch.io
Whilst we were getting on with Super Stack Attack, we were getting a bit worried that there were seemingly lots of stacking games being published from Darren's template.
As worrying as that felt, we still held off from publishing early and continued to work on the game and polish it up.
And a few more staking games were released....and we still carried on working.
The upshot is, our game ended up being N&N....and none of the previous ones did, which proves the old "Creme floats to the top" analogy I guess.
But on the other hand......all those other people who had already published their stacking game before us, might be thinking, "look at these gits coming along after us and stealing our thunder".
I usually hold back from releasing many details of up-coming games to the web (even here), untill I know I'm only a week or 2 from finishing/publishing. But then again, I don't think I have ever come up with any kind of revolutionary idea for a new style of game or anything either.
But in my situation... they are out to get me. All day long I can see evil-doers trying to hack or spam my website. People have illegally used my content too.
Here's a factoid...
In about a year, the number of fake registrations at my website was 5352.
This community is pretty cool overall though. There is a certain respect among the top developers.
its kinda like the tiny wings. not many games had that style with texture. now a bunch do. not that many games had birds(angry birds) now a bunch do. I know how you feel, but I have never been in that spot with game making. I have with guitar though. I practiced my butt off playing guitar and my friend gets a (crappy) guitar and starts telling everyone about all this guitar stuff trying to show off when he cant play crap. he tries to learn the songs I learn and tells everyone that. hes a bragger. I am not. I have only told a handful of people I play guitar.
The same happened with Air Supply - I'd been working on it a few weeks and then Hachiko's template came out, then Darren's free one (you should have seen my face when I saw his '250 templates emailed' comment in that thread!) and the timing just seemed all wrong.
The game came out after a lot of other games made from his template - but I think you could see the difference between them (and indeed many many other running games).
Like you, I don't like to give out details till about 2 weeks from completion.
I don't know where I'm going with this - but just thought I'd agree with what you said from my side
QS
Dr. Sam Beckett never returned home...
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Quantum_Sheep
Web: https://quantumsheep.itch.io
I'm dying to show everyone what I have done so far, but I've only completed 62 levels so far. then I have to go back and put in all the dialog.
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Personally I have had both game style/graphics and game ideas copied very obviously. I'm not bothered by this as in one case the result was a better game than my original. Perhaps I might be bothered if they had a similar name to mine and they were taking sales away from me. So far I have not seen this impact, in fact recently a released game that was extremely similar to one of mine and with a very similar name was released by a gamesalad member (and it is a great game they made). Once this came out it has boosted my sales by quite a bit.
I do agree when the games have really good and cool original ideas that people should be quite guarded in what they reveal early, particularly when that is a genre or visual style that's easy to replicate. However if it is a big game that others can't really copy easily (bumps, grisly manner) then I think it is great to see things people are working on and watch games evolve. It is always good motivation to see great games other people are developing.
I don't mean to continually bag on photics but adding to a development log for BOT every day that kinda tells us nothing and shows nothing because of a fear that people are going to steal it is a bit silly.
I'm joking of course.
I think there's a fine line between being inspired by a game and copying it too much. GS means that the latter is all too easy, especially with the abundance of templates.
Personally, I have resisted the temptation to use anyone's template, only searching for solutions to coding issues I've had. I do look through the App Store and online games sites to help me generate ideas though.
Simon
People I trust the most would be ofcourse Tshirt Booth, Ace, Slick Zero and a couple other people....
But really I get funny about sharing stuff, like those images I have on the forums at the moment.
But I guess it's first in best dress, if the copy the game once it's out, who cares.. if people copy Angry Birds they won't make anywhere near as much.
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