According to the Blu-ray notes and interviews, the writers, record company liner note writer Michael Ronald Ross and his British co-worker Anthony Overman worked on the screenplay since 1969,particularly after Anthony was let go due to downsizing,and went through a couple of producers including the producer of The Godfather.The script was ultimately optioned in 1972 by a producer friend of the husband of Jo Heims, who'd written the films Play Misty for Me and Breezy, and she did a polish job on their script in the hopes that Clint Eastwood might be interested in the project, and either he or a big name star like Jack Nicholson or Jack Lemmon would star in it.Clint ultimately passed on it,saying it reminded him more of Breezy than Misty. While Michael and Anthony were waiting for the producer's option to expire, they planned on a black version since Anthony's musician wife was black and a friend of Richard Pryor's. Pryor and M.A.S.H. star Fred Williamson were interested, but one week before the producer's option expired, he sold the rights to Peter Traynor and Larry Spiegel, and they went off and made Death Game without any input from the writers, and Michael and Anthony only found out the film had been made when the writers guild had to confirm they and not Jo Heims were the primary writers. When Traynor and Spiegel met the writers later,they were a little embarrassed and distant because they thought they bought a script by Jo Heims.The film was shot in 1974 and finished in 1975, but it wasn't released until 1977 because of problems with Peter Traynor's investors, the majority of whom were doctors who allegedly got their investments back triple as a tax return.Due to it's limited 1977 release,Michael Ronald Ross did not see Death Game until 1985 when he was doing liner notes for VHS tapes and came upon the version titled The Seducers. He said it was the same as what he wrote except for the written introduction at the beginning, and the ending, but it was a little off because of the director's dark sense of humor, and the scene with George and the two girls in the sauna was originally more gentle and 60s flower power in it's tone than the steamy 70s pseudo disco version that ended up on screen.

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