UDK & Startup Game Studio

[nucleA]

Thanks for all the reply.

[elvince]

As advices, I would say:
1 - Try to make a short game on your spare time just to be sure you understand the workflow around game creation and what a "real" will cost in term of time & money
2 - As it was mentionned, look at what your want to build and if it may interest people.
3 - As it was mentionned, how cash will come during the development phase (it could be long ). Here I have no advice, but path could be loan, "business angel" funding, self funding, Kickstarter (or others)..;
4 - UDK may be a good choice for a first title. You have full source access engine like T3D from garagegames that went opensource 6 months ago. It all depands of the game you are doing and what's your long term strategy. As it was said, if you win enough money to share 25% royalties, you may be in a position to look for Full Licence for the future
5 - Be the first studio is nice, but it must be a success if you want people to remind it !

good luck

[ambershee]

Snake's advice is very valid. Since you are all friends and working locally, I would add one other piece of potential advice - and that would be to not initially quite the day-job; work in your spare time. You may find that developing a proper game is a more intensive process than you initially thought, or that it is not for all of you. Working on prototypes, like terminatus suggests is a good way forwards.