I've always wondered what prevents people from taking all the graphics, sounds and code and simply steal your entire game? What, if any, recourse do you have?
I just beat the f#*k out of 'em. I'm bigger and tougher than they are usually. Works for me. Don't mess with my stuff, buddy!
Any coder will tell you that behind any successful game is 99% hard work and 1% inspiration. What idea worth stealing that has not already been stolen? - asks the jaded coder. My idea is worth a million bucks. Just make a game like Pokemon Mario only with Halo and cowboys and dinosaurs... - enthuses the game developer. But seriously, stuff get copied all the time, either outright or after alteration. But then again, whatever game you are designing is also based on another game you had seen before right? If you still persist with, but I paid for it, well, just do what the other developers do. Post the progress of your game publicly. Make a lot of noise on your website, blog, Youtube, review sites so people know and can see the progress of your game as it is being made. That way, if your outsourced development team takes your completed project and runs, you already have the internets on your side as they recognise it as your game...
Clearly you should call bigrand1 and he'll sort it out for you!.. Joking aside, if such a thing happened to me, i'll probably just shrug and continue onwards to be honest as i'm not sure if i want to deal with the hassle of for example suing someone, etc. I guess before you start projects, you should get everyone to sign some sort of confidentiality agreement/contract, etc. I do agree that stuff - or ideas/inspiration - gets copied all the time. Its sh*t if someone else doesn't put in any effort and just pirates/nicks other dev's stuff and just releases it under their own banner. But then sh*t happens. If your game/brand is really valuable then clearly you should try to kick up a fuss about it - maybe the media will pick it up. Cheers,