Prototype costs that I should expect

Rainy-
The American manufacturer you mention is a US company that produces in China, so their price will be very low compared to your UK quote. My experience is that printing in the US will cost the same or slightly less than in Europe, but you'll have to weigh the cost of shipping against that. The US prices look better the worse the dollar is doing! Make sure whoever prints your game can help you navigate the new safety laws in the US if you plan on selling here.

As for other costs, they will vary wildly based on how many cards in your game. We usually do prototypes at $500 for 3 games, but that only includes 10 cards per game since they are difficult to do by hand. We charge $1/card for prototypes with more cards than that. Thus, to do a game with 100 cards would cost $600. I have no idea what others will charge you for your prototype. Our price assumes that you have the art completed.

Things I have seen people waste money on that you should not:

Prototypes - when you've already committed to production. With US/Europe production running at 6-8 weeks and prototype making running at 3-4 weeks, why not just wait? Of course, if your game is in China, it might make sense given the longer lead time from there.

Blank Scorepads - Your customers will have blank paper at home.

Printed Shipping Cartons - Usually, its cheaper to get them stickered below 5000 games worth.

Money/Cards - Don't waste money printing extra money or cards. Figure out from your playtests how much play money (or cards) you need.

What is the purpose of your prototype? Are you looking to see if/how the game works? Are you past the playtesting stage and ready to try to shop it around to publishers? Are you planning to self-publish?

These things make a huge difference, and "prototype" can be used to describe all of them.

If you're still playtesting (you have playtested a bunch, right?), then I've heard it said that you shouldn't be spending more than $20 (US) on a prototype. Too much is going to change; more importantly, you need to keep things very flexible and having a "pretty" prototype is going to keep you mired in your original (possibly flawed) design.

Imagine you were designing Trivial Pursuit. How much would it suck to spend a bunch of time and money making a five-section playing piece, and then realize after playtesting that you actually want SIX trivia categories? Would you really be able to trash your (expensive) custom plastic components? Print what you can on an inkjet, and steal bits from other games.

If you're shopping around to distributors then you can spend a bit more, but probably you want to keep it under $30 or maybe $50 if it's really piece intensive. Keep in mind that you'll still want several copies so you can keep tinkering while you send copies out to multiple companies. Also remember that whatever art you want, publishers will probably have their own ideas about theme and style. Don't give them something TOO polished, or they'll think that you won't be able to change it (see above).

Don't overspend, they all have great imaginations anyway. As long as what you show them is playable and professional (no ink-and-napkin boards), you'll be fine. Check out Matt Leacock's prototype images for Pandemic to get a good sense of the level of completion he was at when he shopped it around.

If you're planning to self-publish, of course, then you want something that closely resembles the final product. In that case you're on your own. But the advice above is good: don't spend money on things that people are going to have lying around at home. See what you can re-purpose from other things: do you NEED custom player pieces, or will 1000-to-a-bag mini poker chits work just as well? Does your card printing need to be full color? On both sides? Do you need a solid board or will a wargame "cardboard" board work well enough? And on and on and on. Be ruthless. Don't ask yourself what you want, but rather what you NEED.

I have been finishing my basement as of late and realized what an awesome untapped market Home Depot has for prototyping material.

I can buy 8ft X4ft of .25 inch wood for about $8.00 and just went and bought some insulation foam board for about $2.00. I am using this for board components and it is working great. You have to have some saws and stuff though, but those tools are useful to have whether or not you are making a board game.

If you're ready to send to publishers, then presumably your design is more or less complete, and you've playtested all the map permutations. Your map is therefore ready to be something a bit more permanent. Print it up on cardstock and you should be good to go. If you really want to get fancy you can get some heavy "science-fair display" foam-board and glue your map on that.

But are you really done? Have you playtested it lots and lots and then some more? Don't send it before you're truly finished with the design.

This post from Rainbow Rapid Manufacturing is bordering on blatant advertising, something that we DO NOT tolerate on BGDF. However, it is on topic so I will allow it to stay (that's not to say one of the other moderators might remove it anyway). The difference between this post and someone like Gameprinter's is that GP has an established relationship with this community and he also provides valuable knowledge/information, not just a sales pitch. Also, since no one here has used Rainbow Rapid manufacturing, I would say to use extreme caution if you do decide to use them yourself. AKA, buyer beware!

-Darke