How about having a detailed form for them to fill in and email to you so you can peruse this before speaking on the phone? Much as job applicants would fill in a CV. Then include a section on how they intend to finance the project, milestones etc. As before, make it clear on the website you are only interested in pre-financed work.

Then you can quickly reject those that do not meet the criteria, and reply with a pre-canned email with the reasons for rejection (e.g. finance) and how they can fix their submission so that it may be suitable in the future. Something like, should you acquire finance we will be happy to move further with the proposal.

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And there's no denying that after several hundreds (maybe thousands by now?) of such discussions, it takes its toll, and it gets harder and harder to ignore the implied insult, even though it may be inherently be just pure ignorance.

Just some thoughts. This problem has a technical response, for which I am liking the idea lawnjelly proposes quite a lot (the intake/proposal form). It also has an inner philosophical response. You know this already, but no one really talks about this so much. "Implied insults" are literally everywhere, and its easier to ignore those which don't hit so close to home. But are they inherently different? Not really. From the POV of the person with the next great idea, they HAVE to ask JUST IN CASE you might change your mind because their idea is so freakin awesome. (BTW I love how the guy projects profits from Project A to fund Project B! Hey, man, its a plan, right?) I think that is ignorance, and ignorance can be terribly annoying. 

You might lessen the impact of these annoyances and prevent them from becoming insults (which I think you correctly ascertained is the result of the sheer number of these over time) by positioning yourself as a teacher and schooling them a bit.  Im not talking about being a smart ass or a "serial asshole". You can actually in just a few sentences explain what you explained to the guy you quoted with something along the lines of "My business depends on a careful balance of time investment and predictable financial returns on a month to month basis, and so I have to choose my projects accordingly. I always appreciate a person's enthusiasm for their ideas and their pursuit in taking them to the next level. I encourage you to find someone with the needed resources of time to help you do that.  To help you succeed, I would recommend drawing up a proposal with some more specifics regarding your timeline (bla bla, technical words here). Best Wishes for your project"

So you have 1) Made it clear how you operate and why. It can't be argued because it makes sense 2) Positioned yourself as a supporter of ideas and validated them. It doesn't matter if they deserve the validation or not  3) Given them concrete help and possibly save another person having their time wasted  4) sent them off with smile.

I've had to do all these things when running an entertainment business for just about 25 years time. It makes you feel better to not have to give them your personal frustration which is none of their concern or their business. And I will tell you it WORKS. 

Interesting sidebar: I got to the point where I could tell if the person calling had the funds or not just by how they said "Hello". Not kidding. I'm not sure I can describe it. But I was able eventually to deploy something along the lines of the price structure and wiggle room without too many specifics earlier and earlier in the conversations which reduced time wastage dramatically. But I do understand exactly what you mean by you don't want to put them off at the start by being too rigid about pricing because you are in fact flexible. That was my exact situation and its definitely tricky. However that feeling of being insulted went away when I employed the methods I've described. Kept me sane on many an occasion!

I may be a day late to the party, but I don't even thing it deserves more than a cursory reply.

From what you've written you're building a company that produces its own stuff and also takes paid contract work.  This message is not your own project, nor is it paid contract work. No matter how they worded it, they are looking for an investment, in this case an investment of time instead of cash.  You aren't in the business of making these investments.

I can imagine a response like this. It could be modified for future "opportunities" you receive:

Thank you for your inquiry. From your letter it seems you are looking for an investor or business partner, not a contractor. 

This company accepts paid contract work. This means our clients pay a portion up front when we sign a contract, and pay portions for each milestone reached. The company does not do any work until after the first payments have been received. 

If you are looking to hire us to develop your idea we can discuss an agreement, including our fee structure.  

Sincerely, 

On 24/02/2018 at 1:30 PM, Orymus3 said:

And I think it makes sense that newcomers have a lot of hopes, and that the few that survive these hopes getting crushed repeatedly end up actually making games, but even knowing this still doesn't come close to making it right.

I have been thinking about this whole discussion all week.  And I got a couple things to comment on and I'd like to hear your thoughts. 

Around here I get the impression there are some who consider themselves seasoned developers as compared to others.  I even fall under this category and I do view development by some to be amateurish to my standards.  And I can imagine there are those around here who consider my aspirations and attempts at development amateurish to their own respective standards.  I think this is only natural.  However; this does seem to present a conflict of interest when the gap between the two groups grows too large and the expectations at both ends seems unreasonable; to me at least.  It seems odd that in one breath seasoned developers recognise the futility in making games and it's return on investment, and then place themselves in a position where they ask others for money to help others in their own futile efforts.  To be honest I don't know who's the bigger dreamer.  As an aspiring game developer, if I was going to invest my hard earned money ( thousands of dollars ) in someone unknown to me for the development of a game, I'd want to be absolutely certain that person believed in the project and believed the project could actually have a legitimate return on investment.

As for my own game, I haven't convinced myself yet the project has a legitimate future, I'm not there yet, but if the day comes that I do believe its future is viable, then I'd expect a developer I pay for their services to believe as well, I'd want them to be just as inspired.
 

I wouldn't say making games is futile. The amount of 'luck needed' decreases significantly with experience. Sometimes it's because of the experience itself (making fewer rookie mistakes, resulting in a genuinely better game) and sometimes it is based on a bias (AAA veteran dropoff studios get more press than a 18 years old basement indie on average, but not always).

What's more, there are 'yes-men' everywhere, they will tell someone else their idea has value, even if it doesn't. I've put myself in a position where I can afford to say no, I pick my projects, and I never have to take on projects I don't think genuinely stand a chance. Of course, some projects are more risky, but the work being done isn't any less valuable there.

I've always been very self-conscious about my value in the industry, and for the past 6-7 years, I've kept a close watch on whether I was 'profitable' (even before, when I was still an employee). It matters to me. I also engaged in gamejams (notably the Week of Awesome II, III, IV) just to make sure I'm still relevant, that I can still do the work, etc. I'd hate to be a fraud, so I keep on testing myself to measure the extent of my abilities.

So, it is entirely possible to be inspired, but getting paid is also the means through which you secure serious developers: people that aren't just there because they need to (if you want some of THOSE, there's thousands on freelancer.com, and my experience working with them is consistently bad at best!)

My line of reasoning is, if the work I did so far has proven time and time again that my work is worth (more than) the $ I'm asking for, this is fair, and nothing like 'dreaming'. Now, how to assemble that work in such a way that it has value, that's actually the other person's role (it's their game after all) but even there I try to help because I do care about what I work on. I'm past the point of needing to work on projects for the sake of money, I'm at a point where I want these projects to have a legacy of their own. But luck still plays a huge part, and though I take serious risks on my own games, I shouldn't take the bulk of the risk when working on someone else's idea, that's where I draw the line. It is a professional service exchanges, in a market that's governed by capitalism. There's nothing wrong with it, and even if there were, these are the rules we've all agreed to operate with (although I'll admit I've done more than my share of barter to lessen costs).

It would be different if we were talking about 50 50 partnerships, which we're not: my contracts clearly state that the ownership of the work is my clients, not me. They get to reap the massive upside, so it makes sense to also face the appropriate level of risk. If one of these projects skyrocket, they make tons, whereas I won't, so why should I take that kind of risk?

Also, the simpler, shorter answer is: I can afford to say no to every rev-share because I've got more than enough paid projects, so why should I take any risk if there's simply no upside to it? (whatever will be said of rev-share based projects, they're still generally less promising because the reasons that led someone to rev-share in the first place is a good indicator of how shaky the foundation is).

3 hours ago, Orymus3 said:

, I shouldn't take the bulk of the risk when working on someone else's idea

This is they key, I think. If the Idea guy could help carry the burden of making a game then there isn't a problem.

It's just too bad that paying money is often the most effective way they have of helping. If it's a person with some skill they can at least form a partnership, with them helping to reduce the cost.

1 hour ago, Scouting Ninja said:

This is they key, I think. If the Idea guy could help carry the burden of making a game then there isn't a problem.

It's just too bad that paying money is often the most effective way they have of helping. If it's a person with some skill they can at least form a partnership, with them helping to reduce the cost.

I think it goes a bit further than that though:

If I partnered up with, say, an artist, on his game, and he'd offer rev-share, I'd be like:

So, you do (roughly) 50% of the work, you control the IP, and we split the sales? Even then I feel this isn't exactly fair, as he still owns the IP, etc. But in essence, yes, this is more or less the problem I see.

22 hours ago, Orymus3 said:

So, you do (roughly) 50% of the work, you control the IP, and we split the sales? Even then I feel this isn't exactly fair, as he still owns the IP

Yea, this is a bit of a stretch, Art isn't 50% of the game so no one would do such a deal. Only a very inexperienced artist would believe art is 50% and there inexperience will only make it a pain to work with them.

The same goes for anything, if the person doesn't really understand how much they are contributing then they are too inexperienced to be making demands.

You could always try to convince them on a better deal and if they don't accept then that is that.