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列举独立开发者需要处理的繁琐工作

发布时间:2014-04-17 11:41:34 Tags:,,,

作者:Dan Marshall

每个人都知道,独立开发者是世界上最棒的工作。你不仅能够穿着内衣裤坐在沙发上,边吃着麦片边玩游戏,你还可以悠闲地制作枪支等等内容。但悲哀的是,有时候这种乐趣和游戏将会变成一件苦差事,而你将不得不去执行各种烦人的文书工作。

以下是关于独立开发者需要面对的一些无聊的文书工作以及如何快速完成它们的快速指南。注:我是以作为英国开发者的经验进行说明。你可以将其应用到自己的情况中。

Paperwork(from henleynews.co.uk)

Paperwork(from henleynews.co.uk)

成立一家公司

这点很重要。因为如果你获得了成功,你便需要一家正式的公司去支付税收。逃税显然是违法的,你应该不想在自己半裸地吃着麦片时被破门而入的警察逮个正着吧。

幸运的是,建立一家公司并不是什么难事。你可以在网上花30英镑而快速做到这点。认真地思考你的公司的名字,你肯定不希望给它取一个糟糕的名字并在之后做出修改。当你在设置这些内容时,先申请一个公司银行账户。你需要分清楚个人的收益和公共资金。友好的银行经理将很乐意为你建立公司银行账户。虽然这是一件非常无聊的工作,并伴随着许多文书内容,但你却不能忽视它。

会计人员

找到一个会计人员对你来说是100%有价值的事。计算需要交多少税并填写所有的表格对你来说既困难又无聊。而会计人员最擅长做的便是这些事。

即使他们每一年要向你收费1000英镑,但是因为他们了解系统的各个细节,并且能够让你自由地去设计枪支,所以他们的作用远大于你的想象。会计人员同样也能够告诉你赚钱的最佳方法,以确保你既能够支付国家保险也能够支付所有的个人税。我建议你能够以每个月为单位支付自己报酬。因为你每个月都需要支付房租,房屋贷款,食物以及其他现实生活中的开销。

制作一个Excel表格去记录你的成本,即公司账户上的每笔支出与收入。甚至精细到每一分钱。每个月登陆你的网上银行并复制黏贴所有交易,并设定一个专栏让你的会计能够知道每一项各是什么(游戏邦注:例如“139.99英镑是给Chairs-R-Us”,你将在一小栏中添加“更换办公室的椅子”以让他们知道这是免税的)。这是值得你每月做一次的事,如此不仅能够确保你在会计需要并忘记时将其传递给他们,同时也能够让你随时了解自己的财务状况并确保自己是否会破产。

自由职业者

如果你是与其他人一起做事,你最好能够与他们签订一份协议,证明他们所创造的内容的所有权是属于你的,你可以根据自己的喜好做出任何决定。虽然这很无聊,但是不会花费你太长时间。制定一份完整的协议书并涉及所有可能发生的事,让所有帮助你做事的人都能够签订这份协议。如果你未拥有这样的协议,也可以请求律师发一份给你。

律师

律师之所以很重要是因为他们能够在你面对其他律师时帮助你阻止糟糕情况的发生。我看过《金装律师》(第一季和第二季),并且不希望不希望像电视剧中的律师那样费脑子去思考各种复杂的事物。Sheridan’s是公认的独立开发者寻找律师的最佳去处—-这是有理由的。他们真的很友好且会经常给独立开发者买啤酒,受到如此好的待遇的你肯定会在遇到法律上的问题时主动找到他们。在此之前,你应该先给Alex Tutty发封邮件去介绍自己。让他知道你是谁。看,你能在页面上方发现他的电子邮箱。他将尽所能去帮助你。

合同

大多数合同都非常直接。对于一份简单的分销协议,你应该阅读所有的内容并明确它是否合理。你是一个聪明人,这只是阅读而已。如果你所面对的是一些较为重要的内容,如与大型主机公司的合作,或者一些自己较不熟悉的内容,或者你想要得到某些内容的解释,那就联系你的律师并让他们帮你看看合同。再一次证实了律师的好处,这将为你省去不少时间和思考。

发票

运气好的话,人们将为你的游戏花钱。如果可能的话,安排好一切让资金可以直接进入你的账户,否则你将不得不写“发票”。获得一个模板,将你的所有公司信息填在上面,并希望只要填一下基本信息就好,然后将其通过电子邮件发送出去。发票并不需要花费你太多时间,但是如果你一个月需要写4或5张发票的话应该会被烦死吧。所以让资金直接进入你的账户,并解释自己因为忙于设计游戏而不能一直去写发票。

以上便是你需要面对的所有烦人的文书工作。因为这很无趣,所以才需要适当的系统去帮助你快速做到这些事。Ultimate Dream便提供了这类型的服务,你可以给他们发送电子邮件,让他们帮助你做完所有的这些事。

但在此之前,你需要自己先认真地做好它们。

本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译,拒绝任何不保留版权的转载,如需转载请联系:游戏邦

All the Boring Bits of Paperwork you have to do as an Indie Developer

by Dan Marshall

Everyone knows that being an indie dev is the best job in the world. When you’re not just playing games on the sofa in your underpants surrounded by Crunchy Nut Cornflakes, you’re idly making guns and things that explode. Sadly, once in a while, the fun and games turns to drudgery and you have to do paperwork.

Here’s a quick guide to the boring paperwork you can expect as an indie dev, and how to do it as quickly as possible. NOTE: I’m speaking from experience as a UK dev. Take it with a pinch of salt, and apply to your own country.

Setting up a company

This is important, because if you’re even remotely successful you need to have an official company in order to pay taxes. Not paying taxes is, apparently, against the law, and the last thing you need is the police popping round when you’re half-naked and surrounded by Crunchy Nut Cornflakes. “’Ello ‘ello ‘ello, what’s all this then?” they’ll say as you stare up at them with bits of cereal half up your bottom. Doesn’t bear thinking about.

Fortunately, setting up a company is easy. You can do it online, quickly and for about £30. Think long and hard about your company name, you don’t want it to be shit and have to rename the company. While you’re setting things up, nab a Company Bank Account. You need to keep your personal beer money and your Official Funds very, very separate. Your friendly bank manager will be only too happy to set one up for you. It’s a boring job, and comes with paperwork as heavy as a brick, but only needs doing once.

Accountants

It is absolutely, 100% worth your time to get an accountant. Working out how much tax you have to pay and filing all the forms is both HARD and BORING. What’s more, accountants are so good at it that they basically pay for themselves.

Even if they charge you £1000/year, they’re probably saving you more than that by knowing the ins-and-outs of the system, AND it’s freeing you up to design guns. Accountants will also be able to discuss the best way of paying yourself, to make sure you’re still paying National Insurance and all your personal taxes properly. I suggest you pay yourself once a month. You need to pay rent and mortgages and food and all that real-life stuff.

Keep an Excel document of your costs, every penny that goes into and out of your company account. Yes, every. Single. Penny. Each month, log in to your online banking and just copy-paste everything over, and have a special column to let your accountant know what it was (ie “£139.99 to Chairs-R-Us”, you’d add “replacement office chair :( ” in a little column so they know it’s tax-deductible). It’s worth doing once a month, not only so you can just send it on when your accountant needs it and forget about it, but also in order to keep on top of your finances and make sure you’re not going bankrupt. YAWN, right?

Freelancers

If you’re working with other people, it tends to be a good idea to get them to sign a little bit of paper confirming that the work they do for you is yours, and you can do what you like with it. Boring, but it doesn’t take long. Get yourself a decent release form that covers all eventualities, and get everyone who helps on the game to sign it. If you don’t have a release form you can use, you can ask a lawyer to send you one. Talking of lawyers:

Lawyers

Lawyers are good and important because they stop bad things happening when other lawyers get in touch. I’ve seen every episode of Suits (season 1 and 2) and have no desire to have to think as hard about things as those lawyers do. Sheridan’s are the default go-to lawyers for indie devs, and with good reason. They’re really nice and friendly and frequently buy beer for indie developers, so the very least you could do is to drop them a line if you find yourself in legal trouble. Before it gets to all that, drop Alex Tutty a line and introduce yourself. Just say hello, let him know who you are. His email’s right on that page, look. He’ll help you out however he can and it’s probably a good idea to introduce yourself BEFORE the police come a-knocking

Contracts

Most contracts are fairly straight forward. For simple distribution deals, have a read through and you’ll probably understand it just fine. You’re a smart kid, it’s only reading. If it’s something serious, like for one of the Big Console Guys, or if it’s remotely out of the ordinary, or if there’s ANYTHING you want clarification on, contact your lawyer and get them to look over it for you. The good thing about getting a lawyer to do it, is it’ll save you a lot of time and heartache down the road.

Invoices

With any luck, people will pay you money for your games. If possible, get things set up so any funds go directly into your bank account, because otherwise you’re going to have to write “invoices”. Get yourself a template, slap all your company information on it, and then hopefully it’s just a case of filling in some basic info and emailing it on. Invoices don’t take long, individually, but when you’ve got four or five coming in a month it all racks up. Get them to pop it into your account directly, explain that you’re too busy designing explosions to write invoices all the time.

That’s it! That’s all the boring paperwork you’ll have to deal with. It’s preposterously dull, which is why it’s smart to have systems in place to get it out of the way as quickly as possible. The Ultimate Dream is to sell enough copies of a game that you can afford to hire someone else, give them an officeManager@yourcompany.com”>officeManager@yourcompany.com email address, and get them to do all the above for you.

Until then, do it smart, and do it properly.(source:gamasutra)


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