Have you considered asking the other party to assume some risk, i.e., they should buy UnityPro themselves and then work for you under a written contract, pay them in short milestones until it is fully completed?
If you are going to do like that, you would be on the hook for salary or wages and you would have problems trying to get back the serial number after the person finish using it.
How would you handle this dispute: you don’t pay the person and then the person claims ownership of the serial number as payment for services rendered during that time?
If the person is not proficient, the project quality could be similar to the quality of Ashes Cricket 2013 game.
if your B has unity pro he can just do the project in his and share it with you via something like bit bucket and open it in your licence. There is no reason for him to be using your licence if he has one of his own.
A team licence is pointless unless you are actually working inside unity as a team. Bit bucket is free and sufficient for what you want.
Thanks eskimoejoe , the reason i wanted to purchase the the license for my programmer is for continuous ownership of the work as they created it.
They cannot claim ownership of the serial number (license) because it would be bought by me , under my name also registered under my account on the u3d website. so basically i wanted to know if they would the be able and willing to keep dual licenses on their computer ( their own license which they probably use to work for other clients … and then mine as well ) .
Hey TheRaider ,
a.) the reason i wanted to purchase the the license for my programmer is for continuous ownership of the work as they created it under my license.
b.) i took a look at bit bucket, it seems like a script and code sharing site in a team based environment.
1.) so Does that offer me ownership and copyright of the work done by my programmer ? or
2.) why not just have the programmer deliver the scripts and code files directly to me via dropbox ?
c.) okay, Good , so i don’t need to get a team license.
Thanks for the response
Bit bucket allows to updates to pushed regularly and you can do things like fork to keep old copies of the code. But yes it is a tool for collaboration so dropbox would be okay too. This would allow you have daily copies of the project so if it goes south you have the project for someone else to finish. I was just pointing out this would an option rather than a team licence.
I think you have a misunderstanding of continuous ownership. The fact he is using your licence doesn’t protect you anymore since he is the creator of the work and has possession of the work. The agreement you make and documentation of that agreement is what gives you ownership. That would be backed up by the fact you are paying him. If you aren’t paying then the documentation might not matter.
For example where I work we have lots of licences of software where we run classes. Someone comes and creates something using that licence and takes it home. We have no ownership over what they create despite owning all the licences. If you think about it, it makes perfect sense.
Hey TheRaider. That clears up a lot
a.) Bitbucket private repo is free - so its a better option for me ( github is $7/month for private repo)
b.) Okay so owning a U3D a license does not guarantee copyright of work. An NDA or CA would be the best option
c.) Could you send me your portfolio of games ? OR recommend somebody you know ? What do you think of freelancer or odesk to hire U3D developers?
Thanks so much for the info. Excellent stuff .
FG1
Just one quick note, in order to hire a freelance make sure you hire someone in your area, and also make sure you really have a budget, game development is really expensive.
Example, someone living in a country with a salary of 300$/month contact me, he wants to make his “awesome” game, the game he wants will be a 3 months job maybe 4, and his budget is 2500$.
The salary on my country is 3500$ per month minimum, so the math is simple, 3500x4 = 14k$, obviously he wasted my time (and his time) because he clearly don’t have a budget to work with me and I consider his offer just a waste of time, but maybe for someone in his country charging the same amount (300$) this will be a perfect job.
Bad advice.
It doesn’t matter where the person works.
Find the developer that best fits your skill and budget requirements.
1.) Get a reference from previous clients (verify the clients and the completed work too)
2.) Look at their portfolio and verify the releases are legitimate.
3.) Work initially in small, very clearly defined, signed off milestones (No more than 1 week’s work at a time)
This is not always true. If you do a good job of vetting the person then it doesn’t make a whole lot of difference where they are from… but it also depends on how important your funds are to you and the protections you’re afforded under the law. I’ve seen many (non-game related) projects get outsourced only to have the developers disappear. This can happen anywhere, but if you’re looking outside of your own country your legal options can be much more limited.
To answer a) bit bucket IMO is a better option for you. It is by atlassian who are a big trusted company. It is awesome. We use it all the time. I also use source tree with it (also free). Unless you need something it doesn’t offer, which from the small amount of information we have doesn’t seem to be the case.
b) NDA protects ideas and would obviously provide protection so long as the NDA is valid. The contract you have with the freelancer would be work for hire, which means the copyright becomes yours. If you are this worried it is better to take proper legal advice than anyone on this forum myself included.
c) My current big project I am proud of it Mars yard maps, it is a collaborative educational mapping tool http://www.nbnmarslab.com/resources/about-mars-yard-maps/ The really awesome thing is you can all work on the same map at the same time and it updates automatically. Another app I am very proud of is Thinkspace AR http://www.powerhousemuseum.com/thinkspace/apps/ar/ I also have the game cosmic balance https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/cosmic-balance/id591644211?mt=8 amoung lots of other different developments too many to list. I just like making stuff 
PS I agree with the sentiment that working with small increments makes the process easier, builds trust and makes sure the project is going the way you want. It is easy to rectify problems early on which 2 months into the project would be hard to fix.
I fully agree with you, location doesn’t matter BUT just as you said, “Find the developer that best fits your skill and budget requirements”, the problem is that people is trying to find those developers without spending time researching about the country where they live.
Nothing pisses me off more than people that contacts me with the classic, “I want a temple run clone and my budget is 2000$”, yeah, another time waster…
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They can use UnityFree. They have no money to allocate $75 a month for the UnityPro subscription license? They earn less than $300 a month?
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You need to make a contract to specify the coder will give you full rights to your project. That is your only legal protection. You also have to state that after the contract, the developer cannot use the same code for other projects, nor state you on their portfolio (if you need that).
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You do not need any license. You can even ask the developer to use Unity Free. Some of my employees here have published their work on iTunes using UnityFree.
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It is good to use Freelancer. There are cheating people who want to do nothing and then get paid. You can see two screenshots at the below URL where I was refunded back the money. They also cancel accounts of people who use aliases.
http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/209652-Lands-of-Ammox-Mobile-MMORPG-in-development/page2
Hey EskimoJoe ,
Yes, il have to make an NDA .I’m trying to pick between freelancer and odesk.
Odesk seems more dedicated vs. Freelancer which seems better for short projects.
if you have any recommendations of developers please let me know
Thank you very much for the info
This is so true.
Unless they are a true employee ( not a contractor ) or you have a written contact assigning you the copyrights they still have the copywrite to anything they produce. It doesn’t matter if you buy/assign them a Unity license and that you paid them to do the work.
People that pay to have websites built for them get burned by this over and over.
It doesn’t matter what happens in court, if the developer can’t afford to re-imburse you there is nothing that can happen, and no way you can get your money back. Either that or they declare they can pay you back $50 a month until you have been re-imbursed, and that is only if you win the case and have paid through your aas for legal fees.
You’re better off just working with the right people from the start than trying to recovered a few thousand $$$ going the legal route.
The only advantage of them working in the same area is that if you sue/take them to court you don’t have to travel too far to appear in court.
I can add to this…
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For a Git GUI client, download SmartGit, it is by far the most intuitive and nicely laid out client I have ever used, for any source control.
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Copyright of work is the actual doing of it. When you make a game you have automatic copyright. This work can be made public through screenshots and videos on YouTube (which is good for date tracking etc).
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For a collaboration tool for managing tasks among a team, I highly recommend Trello, it is a visual web based tool for dragging cards/tasks around and assigning them to people. It is simple yet extremely powerful and visual. We would be lost without it now.
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Regarding finding a developer, go through the commercial work forum and look for developers with portfolios. Contact 2 or 3 people in their portfolio and get a reference.
Really?
You should see where some of the scammers on the forum live. In villas, condominiums, three story 10+ room houses, there seems to be plenty of people who fall into their advanced free fraud on this forum.
When you hear about Rosor having to deal with high costs of living, Nestor the modeller having trouble with customers, people complaining about slave labour, it is stunning to hear about such complacent attitude with losing money over scamming.
You can get the police involved into this, which is amazing since almost nobody files police report on this forum, the advice is to “suck it up” while the tens of thousands $$$ goes to fund the lavish lifestyle of these scammers.
You can get them to sell their iPad, iPhone, Android devices, all their equipment, the title deed for their big car, title deed for their house. If they cannot pay, you can get them spend off-line holiday for two or three years in jail. You can get their salaries garnished by the state and get court appointed deputy to deduct wages.
You should. If you have lots of money, you can probably make an excellent game if you hire good people. On the other hand, if you hire bad people, you can lose all your money and have nonsense. Whose fault? Should you follow the advice suck it up, keep silent, and let the scammer continue do his highly profitable business and live in his big house?
You need two documents - the NDA and contract. The contract should stipulate no re-out-sourcing, e.g., the project gets re-sourced to someone else on this forum or somewhere else, a time-frame which this project should be completed or reasonably completed, the things to be done, in detail, any changes should have the understanding of both parties You should get at least 3 separate quotes.
You should go off-line, go sent it by urgent mail or delivery. My experience is that 50%, 50% of the time it will come back as undelivered and no such person lives there.
You should go to some full production studios - there’s this person on the forum called Flaming Hairball, Iron Belly Studios, Rosor or ProFactor. Check them out.
Actually that isn’t accurate.
If you hire someone to produce content specifically for your game, you own that content. (assuming that you have paid them, and that email exchange makes it clear what you are requesting and what is to be delivered.) That is “work-for-hire” and the person paying for the work produced owns the content. This is all standard US copyright law and is automatic. It can be changed if both parties agree to it, but the default is ownership is that of the one doing the hiring.
NDAs/CAs are not about ownership, they are about not discussing/dispersing information about a project you are being shown or working to sources outside those specified.