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A friend and I have been working on a game off and on for a year or two now, and while it's not ready to release yet I thought it's probably a good time to start thinking about exactly what that would entail. I've got a few questions:
Thank you in advance for not laughing too hard at my terrible idea
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Apr 24, 2018 15:20
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I can't speak on most of these points (if any), but you would want an LLP with your buddy most likely. State laws vary. It is helpful for tax purposes, and protects you from being personally liable in the case that your game causes seizures or is actually snow crash irl. You should end up paying quarterly on your expected personal income from the company (if any, i.e. in the case that you live off of another source of income), and you won't be double-taxed. I don't know about the foreign owner thing, but all you need to do is record the split ownership in your articles/filings and make some arrangements for later contributions, partners, and how that might affect ownership down the road. This is all from personal experience so it may be totally wrong.
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Apr 24, 2018 17:52
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dougdrums posted:I can't speak on most of these points (if any), but you would want an LLP with your buddy most likely. State laws vary. It is helpful for tax purposes, and protects you from being personally liable in the case that your game causes seizures or is actually snow crash irl. You should end up paying quarterly on your expected personal income from the company (if any, i.e. in the case that you live off of another source of income), and you won't be double-taxed. Thanks for laying out what they do a bit more clearly. I forgot to mention i'm in Florida, so I assume the LLP would need to be registered there. dougdrums posted:I don't know about the foreign owner thing, but all you need to do is record the split ownership in your articles/filings and make some arrangements for later contributions, partners, and how that might affect ownership down the road. Interesting, thanks. I'll look around a bit more with this in mind, I'm guessing there's probably a bunch of standard templates for writing the articles I can just modify to my needs somewhere.
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Apr 24, 2018 18:05
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dougdrums posted:I don't know about the foreign owner thing, but all you need to do is record the split ownership in your articles/filings and make some arrangements for later contributions, partners, and how that might affect ownership down the road. The UK guy will want to speak to a US tax attorney because, in the admittedly unlikely event this will make any money, he will have to file US taxes and it will be a total nightmare unless the correct steps are taken ahead of time.
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Apr 24, 2018 18:41
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I started an game development studio LLC in WA back in 2006... I have some background on this, however I am not an attorney/lawyer and you should seek professional legal services. 1. You're going to need legal help to file the LLP in FL, at the minimum, to make sure its filed and properly formed. http://dos.myflorida.com/sunbiz/forms/partnerships/ 2. Your friend in the UK should be made an officer of the LLP and contractually given 49% ownership (never do equal shares and it sounds like you have more stake in the company already, so this is even more reason). Again, you are going to want an attorney to draw up the documents needed for this. 3. The purchases you made should be "transferred" to the company after it is formed so the company can claim them. However you can still write off them on your personal income taxes as business expenses, but that makes transferring to the company iffy. Its best if you talk with a CPA and attorney if the purchases are very high-value dollar amounts. If you're talking a few hundred dollars or so, meh. 4. If you are planning on paying the UK guy, you're going to need to figure out if he is an employee of the company (which gets very heavy with paperwork, the company's obligations and taxation) or if he's merely a contractor/consultant, in which case you can usually get by with filing 1099s (i forget what the 1099 equivalent for foreigners is)... TLDR; Get an attorney. This guy has been around a while and was engaged with a Florida studio I worked at back in 2013... http://www.gameattorney.com/
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Apr 25, 2018 00:28
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Slayerjerman posted:I started an game development studio LLC in WA back in 2006... I have some background on this, however I am not an attorney/lawyer and you should seek professional legal services. Oh perfect, thanks Slayerjerman posted:1. You're going to need legal help to file the LLP in FL, at the minimum, to make sure its filed and properly formed. Yeah what you're saying combined with the previous poster's info about taxes convinced me it's definitely worth talking to a lawyer. Slayerjerman posted:3. The purchases you made should be "transferred" to the company after it is formed so the company can claim them. However you can still write off them on your personal income taxes as business expenses, but that makes transferring to the company iffy. Its best if you talk with a CPA and attorney if the purchases are very high-value dollar amounts. If you're talking a few hundred dollars or so, meh. I think total I've spent like $600 so far, so probably not even enough to be worth deducting on my taxes instead of just taking the standard deduction Slayerjerman posted:4. If you are planning on paying the UK guy, you're going to need to figure out if he is an employee of the company (which gets very heavy with paperwork, the company's obligations and taxation) or if he's merely a contractor/consultant, in which case you can usually get by with filing 1099s (i forget what the 1099 equivalent for foreigners is)... Thanks for the recommendation!
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Apr 25, 2018 03:45
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I've got a related question about trademarks and company names - I'd like to have a few names picked out before going to the lawyer, so I don't waste time going back and forth with them. Friend would like to name the company "Bunsoft" which I think is wonderfully adorable, but it's also only one letter away from "Sunsoft" which seems like a problem, but I'm really not sure how this sorta thing works, if that one letter is enough to make it distinct or what. Obviously the final answer on this I'm going to get from the lawyer but I thought I'd ask here if it's even worth pursuing.
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Apr 25, 2018 14:55
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I use the name of an animal, and I put just the name of the animal on everything, as it is filed on a fictitious name resolution. Other businesses in other states or countries use the same name, but it would be very difficult to confuse our businesses otherwise. I ofc am not a lawyer or good at business but I'd imagine Bunsoft would be acceptable as long as you aren't trying to use the goodwill they've established with Sunsoft, or confuse customers. I dunno if you've stumbled across here: http://dos.myflorida.com/sunbiz/start-business/ ... I was trying to find the forms and a sample for you, but they have it pretty well covered. It would be nice if Florida's government sites ended in gov ...
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Apr 25, 2018 15:24
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dougdrums posted:I use the name of an animal, and I put just the name of the animal on everything, as it is filed on a fictitious name resolution. Other businesses in other states or countries use the same name, but it would be very difficult to confuse our businesses otherwise. I ofc am not a lawyer or good at business but I'd imagine Bunsoft would be acceptable as long as you aren't trying to use the goodwill they've established with Sunsoft, or confuse customers. Yeah the logo would be totally different and I'd be careful to differentiate, I guess it's worth a shot  dougdrums posted:I dunno if you've stumbled across here: http://dos.myflorida.com/sunbiz/start-business/ ... I was trying to find the forms and a sample for you, but they have it pretty well covered. It would be nice if Florida's government sites ended in gov ... Thanks! I have no idea why but half our official sites do and the other half are .com's, which means there's a bunch of fake sites out there that phish people incredibly easily. Florida is a dumb state in case you couldn't tell 
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Apr 25, 2018 15:52
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Bunsoft is indeed a very cute name.  I can already picture some cute logos.If you need a graphic designer for any of that stuff, feel free to hit me up! I love doing animal based logos.
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May 23, 2018 15:56
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Nessa posted:Bunsoft is indeed a very cute name. Videogame friend/business partner already excitedly photoshopped up some logos for it since she likes doing that too, but I might hit you up just to have a few options or maybe for something related, thanks for the offer  Anyway thread update: While I liked the videogame lawyer a lot he seems to be based out of Miami which is a good 5 hours away from me (Tampa), so I found a guy locally who specializes in business law (starting businesses, contracts and trademark / IP stuff specifically) that seems pretty good, and best of all who I can walk to the office of from my house. Now I just need to get some free time to actually go talk to him during business hours 
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May 25, 2018 14:41
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Actually I have another question: I'm reading a lot about stuff I'll need to do to run the business properly - keeping good records, proper accounting, what's needed for taxes etc. I've already been saving pretty much any document that seems even slightly important (the receipt for the IDE I bought, the terms of use of the Unreal Engine that the game is based on, stuff like that) but I'm not really sure where to start with accounting. I assume I should just get some software for that, is Quickbooks what people generally use or is there a better one these days that y'all can recommend?
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May 25, 2018 14:49
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I use a product called wave that does everything I need times a hundred, as far as accounting is concerned.
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May 25, 2018 17:33
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Am also considering doing this because a project of mine recently got its first Patreon supporter and I get a few people here and there every month asking to help contribute to the project... so I need to worry about incorporating or forming a sole proprietorship and budgeting even though it's only like $4/month. I remember that video game lawyer guy giving a GDC talk about how you should form and register as a business as soon as you want to start taking your project seriously.
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May 29, 2018 14:03
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dougdrums posted:I use a product called wave that does everything I need times a hundred, as far as accounting is concerned. Oh neat, this looks super useful, thanks! Love Stole the Day posted:Am also considering doing this because a project of mine recently got its first Patreon supporter and I get a few people here and there every month asking to help contribute to the project... so I need to worry about incorporating or forming a sole proprietorship and budgeting even though it's only like $4/month. I remember that video game lawyer guy giving a GDC talk about how you should form and register as a business as soon as you want to start taking your project seriously. I think you automatically count as a sole proprietor without actually doing anything. You need to incorporate or otherwise officially "form" other types of businesses but sole proprietorships just automatically exist once you start making money outside of the normal work or contract framework. You probably don't want to just be a sole proprietor though because then all liability for the company is your personal liability and instead of something like a lawsuit just closing the company it can ruin your life. I could be totally wrong though, talk to a lawyer.
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May 29, 2018 15:29
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Partnerships with foreign partners are much more complicated than you are thinking. Your British friend is going to need to apply for an ITIN. In the event the LLC actually begins making money you will need to begin withholding money to the IRS on his behalf. If you actually expect to make money, British friend should be filing annually to establish business losses on his return to offset future income. Not sure how serious of a venture this is. Consider agreeing on some kind of royalty agreement with your British friend as opposed to equity interest. I realize this is small $'s at the moment but this stuff will come back to haunt you if the numbers get bigger. You will have trouble finding an attorney or CPA with a brain that can intelligently advise/file compliance with a foreign partner involved at a reasonable price. Again, not sure how serious this is. If it's not serious, why bother with any of this?
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May 31, 2018 02:22
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Admiral101 posted:Partnerships with foreign partners are much more complicated than you are thinking. Your British friend is going to need to apply for an ITIN. In the event the LLC actually begins making money you will need to begin withholding money to the IRS on his behalf. If you actually expect to make money, British friend should be filing annually to establish business losses on his return to offset future income. Ah crap, that's what I was worried about. I guess I could set something up other than equity, I just want to make sure (in writing) she's fairly compensated and has some control because she's really the one that's doing most of this and it's her passion project. Thanks for the heads up at least. As far as seriousness, I'm serious enough that I'm willing to put up a few thousand dollars of my own money to get this done (I think a Florida LLC costs $1000 to form, the lawyer's going to be more on top of that, etc.) She's shown the basic gameplay that's been built out so far to a few other game devs and response has been very positive, in fact most recently she showed it to some people who are working on their own game that's similar to this one, that they've been working on for four years, and after seeing our stuff (which really isn't much) they said they thought it "totally blew what we're doing out of the water." I mean I'm not delusional and I doubt this is going to make us millionaires or anything but I think there's definitely something special here that's worth me taking seriously
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May 31, 2018 03:08
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ate all the Oreos posted:Ah crap, that's what I was worried about. I guess I could set something up other than equity, I just want to make sure (in writing) she's fairly compensated and has some control because she's really the one that's doing most of this and it's her passion project. Thanks for the heads up at least. Fair enough. It sounds like you have an idea of what your startup expenses are going to be. Too many entrepreneurs go into this stuff thinking it's just a $80 org document off legalzoom and $150 at H&R block to get compliant with the state/feds. How do you plan to compensate her during the startup periods of losses? Or you envisioning purely a profits interest? Best of luck with the venture.
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May 31, 2018 04:07
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