Coming Soon!!! The next big thing(game) since FaceBook!!!!

Do you have the money to do this yourself? Are you wanting to be a game publisher handling all the business side of logistics, sales, and marketing?

Or do you want a company to publish it?

Either way, you are going to need more than enthusiasm to be successful.

If you are going into business for yourself, you are going to have to learn about the game manufacturing business. That means learning which is the right printer for you, which companies to talk to about distribution, learning where best to advertise, and a whole slew of business decisions that you will need to research before spending a dollar.

If you are wanting a publisher to handle all that and you just want to design games, then you still need to analyze the publishers that make games and see what companies make games similar to yours. Then, you have to find out what their submission guidelines are and go through their hoops.

If you want to leave all the hassles to an agent, then you are looking at the agent taking a sizable chunk of your cash if they succeed... and that's not guaranteed.

Regardless, you should have your game independently playtested before you do anything... that is, have some group of people you have no connection to and do not know give you their thoughts on the game before moving forward.

Even the simplest games today go through a lot of playtests, and blind independent playtests without the designer (or any representative of the designer) in the room. Just the game and the rules. If they can't figure it out, then the rules need work. If the feedback has questions all over it, then the game isn't as clear as you need it to be.

Save yourself time and money and make sure the game is tight even to people you don't know. Remember there is no easy money... even in games and the next best thing.

Good Luck!

Since your game is a card game you can get some decks printed up from Artscow.com for a minimal investment. Then you can start showing the game to people outside of Northeast Ohio. If the game is as good as you say it is and it causes a buzz you can still produce it yourself fairly cheaply..cost wise not quality wise through many manufacturers.

actually following our advice. Maybe your way will work.

But I can pitch to Hasbro any time I like without an agent, so what do I know?

Ummmm....do you know that many other games? I mean, it's true that you can get lucky in this business and "design" a game like Uno that is really only a slight variation on a public-domain game that one can play with a standard deck, but...

one of the first things a designer needs to do is play lots of games and see what's already on the market. In case you haven't noticed, there's an infusion of at least 1,000 new original boardgames into the worldwide market every year these days.

It's very difficult to introduce something new into that market without some connections, and the best way to make those is probably to get appointments with a few publishers at conventions (I believe there's at least one big one in Ohio:). They'll give you an honest opinion, and you can go from there.

Know your market! And then get to know publishers!

Oh man, I'm in between raging and laughing. It can go either way at this point.

You might want to read up on what you're getting into. Also, you should playtest your game THOROUGHLY. Find gaming groups from sites like meetup.com and have them play the game w/o you, then write up a questionaire with questions like "What did you like about the game?", "What DIDN'T you like about the game?", and so on. This will allow your game to be more polished. No matter how good you think your game is currently, there is always someone out there who will challenge and bend rules due to the lack of explanation or a situation you haven't thought of due to the lack of playtesting.

Also, don't get into this with "making money" on your mind. Game design is hardly the road to fast funds.
Don't take short cuts, like asking for hook-ups to a game company or skimping on playtesting.
If everything is done for you, how do you expect to repeat the process on future projects?
Lastly, proper grammar and spelling helps immensely.

Some essential reading:

http://www.amazon.com/Art-Game-Design-book-lenses/dp/0123694965
http://www.amazon.com/Challenges-Game-Designers-Brenda-Brathwaite/produc...

Just forget it. That is one of the illusion that most inexperienced designers have. If you think you are going to make million by designing board games, you should stop designing now.

I don't say that nobody ever made millions with board games, but the odds are as thin as winning a lottery ticket. So you do not want to create yourself false illusions.

In order to do make millions, you must have a mass market game. Which means, playable by anybody, even your grand-mother. If it's similar to uno, that could be a mass market game. But since mass market games unfortunately get sold even 80 years after their release (that is why you always see the same crap in stores like walmart), they will not want to release games that compete to one of their own game. So if your game is in direct competition with UNO, it might simply get rejected. Especially if it is a simple variation of UNO. Finally, you need a broker to be able to submit your game to a mass market company like hasbro because they receives already too much game submission.

Since it seem only to be a card game, there might not be any problems with the production cost unless your game has 2000+ cards. I would strongly focus on 110 because the card print press print in multiples of 110 cards.

I don't want to be negative, I just do not want you to create yourself false hopes.

What the community is telling you is there is no easy way to succeed here. There is some luck, but not even luck is enough. You seem to be trying to find the easy way when there is no easy way.

Do the homework, study the field, attend seminars, read the words that come from people more experienced than yourself and learn from them.

There are stories of people that did succeed through grass roots efforts like the fellow you mentioned. The woman that made Skip-Bo is another story. I know this because I follow games like an obsessive compulsive mouse getting a cheese fix.

Your tone just comes off as someone that isn't taking the game design thing too seriously. The willingness this community has to help people that don't seem to respect the process is likely to fade.

Respect. Tru dat.