Using Product Names

Check out Ghoststop on the web to search for neat equipment that investigators use during their investigations.

Also I would suggest that your game has a day and night mechanic. Not all haunts are active during the witching hours of 9 p.m. to 3 a.m.

Haunts or activities actually happen through all hours of the day, week, month or a certain anniversary or holiday or event or when ever the energy is most active. Also a haunt or episode does not need to be in a old building from the 1830's, for an example. Also, sometimes the location may not the haunted and its the person who is that attracts the unknown.

For equipment based mechanics:

You can use real world equipment or have your players come up with their own gadgets to experiment during the investigations.

Hope this helps you out. I am an paranormal investigator that has experienced quite of bit of the unknown in the field. I do not have a website, but I do have friends who do. If you want to chat sometime, feel free to send me a message. I have stories to tell if you want to hear. Would like to hear more on your game.

Stormy

This comment is probably a bit late, but I agree with QuestCCG, because in writing (science fiction writing, specifially), there is a stylistic flaw that is sometimes called "brand-name fever" - the idea being that the author has described the future by means of name-dropping a lot of brands. At best, you'll end up with a story (or game) which dates very quickly, when any cultural references or connotations that it contained have become forgotten. You can create a lot more atmosphere (again, in a work of fiction, but I do feel that the same can apply to a game) by describing it - in the case of a game, artwork helps with this, of course.

Obviously, this doesn't apply when the product name has been in general useage for a few decades, eg 'xeroxing' for photocopying, 'googling' for doing an internet search and so on. I think this also makes it easier to use legally, but I'm not a lawyer.

Welcome, Zama! I wouldn't spend any time worrying about this sort of thing, especially during the design stage. These things can always be changed later, and there's a long road before publication anyway.

This would only be your concern if you were going to self-publish. If you're going to seek an existing publisher, they'll know what they need to do with the legal stuff and sort it out themselves.

Design from your inspiration -- mundane legalities are not a matter worthy of an artist's attention! It takes a village to raise a published game, and your role in the village doesn't include dealing with red tape.