It seems like the opportunity of a lifetime — a game development competition where indies get the chance to make a new Pong game for Atari. But a closer look at Atari’s Pong Indie Developer Challenge reveals it might not be the opportunity that everyone wants.
Over at Gamasutra today, Brian Robbins writes that the Official Contest Rules for the game challenge reveal that developers are getting the short end of the straw by participating.
These are some of the rules Robbins highlights as being problematic:
• Ownership of submission — Atari has full ownership over every entry submitted, regardless or not the entry is a finalist or wins the overall competition. The specific line in the rules states:
All Entries become the sole and exclusive property of Sponsor {Atari) and will not be acknowledged or returned. Sponsor shall own all right, title and interest in and to each Entry, including without limitation all results and proceeds thereof and all elements or constituent parts of Entry (including without limitation the Mobile App, the Design Documents, the Video Trailer, the Playable and all illustrations, logos, mechanicals, renderings, characters, graphics, designs, layouts or other material therein) and all copyrights and renewals and extensions of copyrights therein and thereto.
This means that if you enter it, it’s theirs — the design documents, the art, all the materials you used to produce it — Atari can do what they wish and profit from it, leaving entrants with nothing. Compared to other competitions like the IGF that allow developers to maintain the rights to the games they make, Atari do not appear to be keen on that idea at all.
• Misleading prizes — Winners can win “up to $100,000” in the game challenge, but only half of this prize money is awarded upfront and the other half is earned from royalties from the game, which means winners can win up to $100,000… if the game sells well enough.
• Royalties structure — Even if a developer does win the challenge, they only receive royalties for the first 12 months the final game is on sale. If there is a sudden spike in sales after the 12-month period, developers do not receive a cut of that.
While the competition is open to US residents only, the takeaway from this is that all developers — indie or otherwise — need to be aware of the wording of the terms and conditions of game-making competitions, even if they are run by companies as well-known as Atari.
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