Chapter 015 - 2005.02.12
This day, I was pitching ideas at the NYC Toy Fair -
with my agent.
After a few years of pitching ideas -
to one particular rep/ owner -
of one particular game company -
and touting my previous successes -
the woman finally caved -
and threw me a bone.
She and her company had secured -
the Desperate Housewives board game license.
She was giving a few of her best inventors -
the assignment creating the best game.
Marc Cherry, show creator,
would be selecting the winning submission.
After I got home -
I went straight to work.
First needed to watch the show -
which I had not been doing.
Fast forward a month or so -
and I got the word -
Marc had selected my creation.
Mine would be the one that would be further developed.
They were claiming it would sell more than a million units.
We were given an extremely low royalty percent -
because of the expected mega-sales.
Marc was quite difficult to work with.
He wanted what he wanted -
with no regard for playability.
He directed an extremely complex game be produced -
nearly impossible to play.
Here's what ultimately was produced:
Sales were way off the mark -
at about 431K units sold.
I netted about $13,000 -
for many months of long stressful work.
The win opened up other doors for me though.
Through the same company,
I did another seven games -
several for Disney brands.
None of them were great games -
as we were forced into a certain mould.
But the more successes I accumulated -
the more other game companies -
gave us a chance and paid attention to novel ideas.