Inventing Games: No Trivial Pursuit

Ever since Trivial Pursuit and Pictionary became mega-hit sellers on the board-game circuit in the mid-1980s and their little-known inventors rose to stardom, basement game making has become a burgeoning business, with hundreds of inventors trying their luck at creating the next national craze.

Toy industry types, from big-time players like Milton Bradley to small-scale representatives, have become so overwhelmed with inventors’ ideas that many companies have shut their doors altogether on would-be toy makers, and others click on the answering machines to handle the wave of inquisitive calls.

The booming business prompted the creation of the Toy Industry Hall of Fame in 1984, and in 1989, the nation’s first bachelor’s degree in toy making was offered at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology.

Industry officials say they get everything from mailed-in, ink-sketched, bar-napkin copies of the next sure hit to full-scale, multicolored renderings of the product.

“Even in these recessionary times, the entrepreneurial spirit is alive and well,” said Jodi Levin, spokeswoman for Toy Manufacturers of America, whose office has seen a doubling in the number of inquiries from inventors over the past few years. “They fall into the same sort of category as (those) who say, ‘I could write a novel.’ Everyone’s got a novel in them, everyone’s got a game in them.”

Like Dick Cholewa.

On any given day, he can be found at his warehouse/office in an industrial section of Orange loading stacks of flat, gray boxes into his old, blue Dodge cargo van. Soon he’ll head north to a Long’s drugstore in Yorba Linda to peddle his creation. Later he’ll head back down to see how it’s selling at a specialty shop called Gamesmanship in posh South Coast Plaza.

Cholewa is a tinkerer with a dash of Yankee ingenuity. Over the years he’s gone from garden nursery owner, to a sculptor of sea-foam green Statue of Liberty replicas, to a creator of stained-glass night lights. All of which have left the 59-year-old with a warehouse full of leftovers and a few dollars richer.

His latest venture is a board game called Russian Roulette. It loosely follows the idea behind the famed gun game--but instead of a loaded pistol chamber, a dice roll of seven is the big setback--and Cholewa insists that it’s as appropriate for children who want to learn to work with numbers as it is for a group of adults who want some relaxing gambling-geared entertainment.

On a shoestring budget and with some help from family and friends--investors, he prefers to call them--he’s scraped together $25,000 to produce 2,500 copies of the game. He figures he needs to sell 25,000 copies to break even.

Like many an inventor, he doesn’t care that marketing trends say that 15-second instructions lure players to games and that the current hot sellers--Scattegories, Outburst and A Question of Scruples--are those that encourage participants to think and talk and laugh together.

Cholewa says he’s got a new angle, a relaxing game that is an alternative to the trendy trivia-oriented, fact-filled, college-level games that are popular across the nation. Plus at $19.95 each, Russian Roulette is more affordable than the $30-something a shot that current those bestsellers go for.

“A lot of people feel left out of a game when they’re not knowledgeable,” Cholewa said. “With this type of game, it’s solely a game of chance. Everyone’s an equal when they sit down. . . . And they enjoy playing it because it’s not taxing the brain.”

Russian Roulette’s poker-style playing chips make it look like a gambler’s game. “Automatically everyone places a value on the chips,” Cholewa said. “It’s more fun that way.”

“I’ve heard time and time again that games are a hard to market, there are so many out there,” but his game, he’s sure, will be the exception to the rule.

Milton Bradley spokesman Mark Morris hears hundreds of stories like Cholewa’s every year, and Toy Manufacturers of America spokeswoman Levin receives thousands more through her company’s voice mail.

Levin and Morris say they’ve heard from all kinds--the inventor who spent every dime and waking hour on a project to the weekend warrior, who quietly works on a game idea outside of a day job.

And while neither a big toy maker such as Morris’ company nor a trade industry association such as Levin’s firm want to discourage new entrepreneurs, they both warn that success is near impossible.

“We could see a zillion of them if we encouraged it. Unfortunately, we cannot look at unsolicited material. Finding a really hot game out of the thousands that would come in would take a lot of effort and not unearth one game,” Morris said.

And both agree that garage gold-mine stories like the legends created by the makers of Trivial Pursuit and Pictionary have drastically increased the inventor craze, leaving the sweet smell of those successes lingering in musty air of basement game makers.

Levin says last year she received 3,000 calls and letters from inventors wanting to know how to sell their toy ideas--double the amount she received in 1986. Ideas ranged from full-scale models to “pencil drawings with ‘P. S. Send royalties too.’ ”

“I wish I had a dollar for everyone who told me they had the next Trivial Pursuit or the next Cabbage Patch Doll,” she said.

A big toy company such as Milton Bradley has a research and development staff that comes up with 4,000 game ideas a year, out of which 25 to 30 new games are produced. Only one or two of those games are expected to survive in stores longer than two to three years.

For that successful game or two to come from an independent inventor is an even rarer occurrence, Morris said.

“People should understand these are the exceptions, not the rule,” Morris stressed. “Even the pros have failed many, many more times than they have succeeded. To say that they beat the odds is to say it lightly. They beat phenomenal odds.”

But just in case, Levin has helped write a book on how to make and sell toys that goes out to thousands of inventors each year, and even she says has no idea what works.

Toy Manufacturers of America’s 19-page booklet offers inventors pointers for creating a product and suggests avenues they can take to try to sell their goods, but there are no guarantees.

First, the booklet stresses research. See what is on toy store shelves and what those goods offer, then see how your product measures up.

Next, look at production. Does the product meet federal safety requirements for children’s toys? Is it cost-effective?

The booklet offers two routes to marketing and selling the product.

There is the dreamer’s route, where an inventor sells his product to a manufacturer, either by displaying it at a toy fair or corresponding with a company that eventually accepts an inventor’s proposal.

Or there is the Pictionary route, the one that Cholewa’s taking. Pictionary inventor Rob Angel drove around with the board game in the trunk of his car and sold it to bar owners and patrons before a professional game-marketing firm picked up the product and turned the Seattle fad into a national, 15-million-sold sensation.

Levin realizes the booklet is not the kind of advice bright inventors like Cholewa want to hear.

“It’s a lot of luck, which is bad news to (inventors),” Levin says. “It’s like breaking into show business. Nobody wants to see you until you’re famous, and you can’t become famous until somebody sees you.”

And she adds: “You could have great (display) space. You could have great advertising. It’s not only got to be terrific, you’ve got to have that magic.”

The Toy Manufacturers of America booklet also encourages designers to protect their product through patent or copyright registration, which Cholewa has done. But Newport Beach patent attorney Leonard Tachner tells inventors to test their product in the markets before they rush to put expensive legal protection on every great idea.

A board game such as Russian Roulette can probably be protected with a simple copyright covering the concept and rules that make it unique. The design--a board with spaces and a pair of dice to advance game pieces--is not what’s new and does not need protection, Tachner says.

That kind of legal aid, Tachner says, costs about $150 to $200 with an attorney, or about $20 without one by filling out a simple form and mailing the fee to the government.

More extensive design protection needs a patent, which needs to be registered within a year from making the product public. A patent can cost up to a few thousand dollars and take a few years for government approval, he said.

Tachner adds that keeping personal files on a product that may eventually need a copyright is an easy route to take in the early stages of invention.

“There’s no reason to rush out and register the copyright,” he said. “You may want to see if your project is going to be a success before you invest in costly legal protection.”

Cholewa may never be inducted into the Toy Industry Hall of Fame, and he knows he’s up against tough odds as he tries to sell Russian Roulette. But he takes the challenge of this latest venture in stride and relishes the trip.

“Let’s face it, everyone who comes up with a game, their first hope is that it’s a Monopoly,” he says. “I’m not the type of individual looking to become a millionaire. If I can make a decent living for myself and a little for others, I’m ecstatic.”

Here are the five questions manufacturers ask to determine whether a game will succeed: * 1. Is it fun?

* 2. Does it have a clear-cut point where someone is declared a winner?

* 3. Is it challenging?

* 4. Is it non-frustrating?

* 5. Does it have repeat value? Source: Research and development staff at Milton Bradley Co.