Hi everyone, I still have a long way until my game is ready to be released, but I would like to start looking on some certain things that always bothered me, would really appreciate inputs.

1- Let's say some users backed my project through my website while still in development, now the game is released, can I give them redeem codes for Steam/Epic? Common sense tells me it's not possible because those platforms will still want their cut, but maybe they give some limited amount of codes or something? Just trying to understand how the system works.

2- About copyrights, I have no money to spend on this, is there something I can do to still protect my work?
If there is nothing, what can I do to avoid someone potentially registering my game name after it's released and preventing me to use it? Should I use some generic name that can't be copyrighted? Thoughts?

3- Anyone have had experience on Kickstarted? Some do's and don't would be great.

Thanks in advance!

Thank you, I tried to use the search engine before but site is totally unresponsive.

I have to send 200 times the same request to be able to get a valid response from the web server.

Is it always like this?

Steam allows you to generate codes for your game for free, as many as you need (unless you do something ridiculous like generating massive amounts of keys for a game that doesn't sell at all).

You are also specifically allowed to give free keys to your backers. Here's Steam's documentation on keys, which includes all the details: https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/keys​

Epic Games Store also has a way to generate keys, but the key request must be approved by Epic (except for “press/promo” keys, you can generate 1000 promo keys, no questions asked). Here's Epic's documentation on keys: https://dev.epicgames.com/docs/services/en-US/EpicGamesStore/AccessKeys/index.html​

@1024 Amazing, much appreciated.