Re:The Game Crafter- CafePress for Boardgames
by cesare on Thursday July 16, 2009 @07:20PM
(#709005)
Agree.
Keeping the rights, having full control on publishing/unpublishing your stuff, and non-exclusivity are the three most important requirements when using these kind of services.
Any of these services (with the requirements stated above) is just another outlet - another opportunity to reach more people - and there's no reason not to join.
Not hard to find: http://www.thegamecrafter.com/publish/rights
Basically the answer is yes (explicitly), you retain rights. Yes (explicitly), you can use the service for prototyping and yes, it is possible start with them and move some place cheaper once it makes financial sense.
What really matters to me is how the licensing is handled. I.e., as long as I own full rights and can pull my game out of their system whenever I want (i.e., if I find that my game is popular enough that I think I can self publish or if I find an established company that wants to buy it), then I don't really mind that they take such a large %. It's still a cheap way to prototype and sell to real game players to get feedback. :)
Anyway, this sounds awesome, but now it means less sleep for the next couple of weeks while I pull all those random scraps of paper that make up my game ideas into something more formal. ;)