Y Combinator is not the only option we are looking into. We have started searching for Angel investors in the area for small amounts of funding ($25k - $75k).Y Combinator is just something else that we are considering. Since lots of successful companies have come out of Y Combinator we find that the network and connections are much more valuable then the initial seed funding.
CrowdStart seems to be geared towards specific projects (or games in our case). We want to fund a company, not a product. I could be totally wrong in this case, since I have not personally used CrowdStart.
Your advice does make perfect sense, apply regardless and then if we get in we can decide if this is the correct choice or not. Another thing that we are considering is that early next year might be too late (we might have already gotten funding or moved passed considering Y Combinator).
