Agreement and forum explanations don't match
by Don Carpenter · in Torque Game Engine · 03/15/2001 (9:51 pm) · 3 replies
I was about to submit this post below and noticed that Tim Gift had enabled access to the 'V12 Technology' forums. I'll post it here in it's entirety and then continue a little.
Tim Gift and Jeff Tunnel - please help us do something about the clashing of mindsets. There seems to be two distinct mindsets of people on this site. One is ecstatic about the $100 V12 engine agreement frontend costs. The other is ecstatic about the $100 V12 engine agreement frontend costs but completely dismayed by the draconian agreement backend. I'm looking for a place that those with legitimate concerns about the agreement backend can go to discuss our concerns.
I have no doubt that GarageGames has every intention of being fair and doing the right thing with those developers that spend huge sums of money, time and talent to produce commercial quality games using the V12 engine for the 'pay bin'. GarageGames probably has everything figured out and your thread posts seem to show that fairness.
But be honest, the agreement doesn't say one third of the things you have been saying in the threads. I will go read the agreement again (a fifth time) - maybe I missed 20 or 30 pages that explain the stuff you gentlemen have been saying and is confusing so many of us. I am only interested in fairness, I believe GarageGames should get rewarded for providing the engine the way they are. My problem is that the agreement doesn't seem to come even near the same planet as the thread posts by Tim Gift and Jeff Tunnel with respect to what is suppose to be in the agreement backend (royalties/distribution rights/COGS/etc.) . Am I reading the same agreement as the staff of GarageGames?
I'm going to sit down for a while and try to think of a set of four or five threads - one for each major area of concern I have with the agreement backend. Maybe splitting the concerns will help.
Thanks for all your effort,
DonC.
Tim Gift and Jeff Tunnel - please help us do something about the clashing of mindsets. There seems to be two distinct mindsets of people on this site. One is ecstatic about the $100 V12 engine agreement frontend costs. The other is ecstatic about the $100 V12 engine agreement frontend costs but completely dismayed by the draconian agreement backend. I'm looking for a place that those with legitimate concerns about the agreement backend can go to discuss our concerns.
I have no doubt that GarageGames has every intention of being fair and doing the right thing with those developers that spend huge sums of money, time and talent to produce commercial quality games using the V12 engine for the 'pay bin'. GarageGames probably has everything figured out and your thread posts seem to show that fairness.
But be honest, the agreement doesn't say one third of the things you have been saying in the threads. I will go read the agreement again (a fifth time) - maybe I missed 20 or 30 pages that explain the stuff you gentlemen have been saying and is confusing so many of us. I am only interested in fairness, I believe GarageGames should get rewarded for providing the engine the way they are. My problem is that the agreement doesn't seem to come even near the same planet as the thread posts by Tim Gift and Jeff Tunnel with respect to what is suppose to be in the agreement backend (royalties/distribution rights/COGS/etc.) . Am I reading the same agreement as the staff of GarageGames?
I'm going to sit down for a while and try to think of a set of four or five threads - one for each major area of concern I have with the agreement backend. Maybe splitting the concerns will help.
Thanks for all your effort,
DonC.
#2
The Draconian agreement backend reference is an approximation of the sentiments of one of the two mindsets that appear to be prevalent on this site at this time. No reason to be offended, that was an observation of the people not a judgement of the agreement on my part.
I have not yet formed an opinion on the agreement because the thread verbage by GarageGames employees and agreement verbage is confusing me.
As an example of confusing statements: On royalties, Tim Gift states that the 50/50 split is after COGS. You state it is a straight 50/50 split of the retail price. The agreement states 50/50 split of the net proceeds. The funny thing about net proceeds is that it is a contractually definable term. Meaning, it's undefined until the contract defines it. All 6 of the games I have negotiated agreements on had a different definition of net proceeds.
I am here to understand,
DonC.
03/15/2001 (10:48 pm)
Jeff,The Draconian agreement backend reference is an approximation of the sentiments of one of the two mindsets that appear to be prevalent on this site at this time. No reason to be offended, that was an observation of the people not a judgement of the agreement on my part.
I have not yet formed an opinion on the agreement because the thread verbage by GarageGames employees and agreement verbage is confusing me.
As an example of confusing statements: On royalties, Tim Gift states that the 50/50 split is after COGS. You state it is a straight 50/50 split of the retail price. The agreement states 50/50 split of the net proceeds. The funny thing about net proceeds is that it is a contractually definable term. Meaning, it's undefined until the contract defines it. All 6 of the games I have negotiated agreements on had a different definition of net proceeds.
I am here to understand,
DonC.
#3
At this point we must keep the contract wording this way. As a poineering on-line publisher, we cannot forsee all legitimate expenses that may come up. However, it is not our intention to use this clause to screw with our development community.
As it now stands, we have no intention of doing that. Since our games are distributed via ESD, we will not have COGS, so it was probably a bad example. We will publish the games, collect the money, then pay 50% to the developer. Tim's post was simply an example of the way it would work if we had COGS.
Many of the issues brought up in this forum are outside of the V12 ESD publishing agreement since they are related to what-if's about box distribution. As stated in the on-line contract, the box distribution agreements will be negotiated in a separate contract.
I have been trying to give these people an idea of what we expect and what they can expect. If your group is good enough to pre-negotiate those points, I am more than willing to listen.
Jeff Tunnell
03/15/2001 (10:59 pm)
This whole thing started from Mike Cronin's post about expenses. COGS ended up being an example of the type of legitimate expense that could be deducted in order to form Net Receipts.At this point we must keep the contract wording this way. As a poineering on-line publisher, we cannot forsee all legitimate expenses that may come up. However, it is not our intention to use this clause to screw with our development community.
As it now stands, we have no intention of doing that. Since our games are distributed via ESD, we will not have COGS, so it was probably a bad example. We will publish the games, collect the money, then pay 50% to the developer. Tim's post was simply an example of the way it would work if we had COGS.
Many of the issues brought up in this forum are outside of the V12 ESD publishing agreement since they are related to what-if's about box distribution. As stated in the on-line contract, the box distribution agreements will be negotiated in a separate contract.
I have been trying to give these people an idea of what we expect and what they can expect. If your group is good enough to pre-negotiate those points, I am more than willing to listen.
Jeff Tunnell
Torque Owner Jeff Tunnell
There is nothing like having a couple of thousand people probing the depths of your contract. With that many people, there are bound to be differing opinions.
I don't want to get a flame war going, but I take offense to your statement that the back end is draconian. The simple fact is, you pay a small amount for a technology, GarageGames publishes it, we split the income. We must have the ability to not publish a product and we must have the ability to recoup costs.
Jeff Tunnell GG