Giaf and you need to go to twitter and fight round after round after round cous you 2 are filling this topic like a bitch fight and nobody wants to loose, so go to twitter and sort it out.The formula was for SSM, not GG, and based on completely different timelines. So, sorry, you are now resorting to lying/putting words in people's mouths.
Heavenly Sword was only 3 hours long. Not even close to the examples given by that other poster.Heavenly Sword reviewed well too but people complained about that. It was gamers complaining not reviewers per se.
Revenue = 770mRagnarok is already closing 1B in Revenues, if we count bundles then probably 2B.
Forbidden West hasn't been as successful for sure but I'm pretty sure it has made some millions in profit.
Giaf and you need to go to twitter and fight round after round after round cous you 2 are filling this topic like a bitch fight and nobody wants to loose, so go to twitter and sort it out.
Oh okay if going by speed runner numbers. No normal gamer is beating it that fast. I guess you believe God of War is an hour long game because there's a trophy for that?Heavenly Sword was only 3 hours long. Not even close to the examples given by that other poster.
6 hours, whatever, it was short as fuck. that’s the point. No replay value, no trophies, it’s a shit example regardless.Oh okay if going by speed runner numbers. No normal gamer is beating it that fast. I guess you believe God of War is an hour long game because there's a trophy for that?
Nah it was perfectly fine considering the quality. Regardless there were many games that reviewed well that got bashed for being short including those previously mentioned. Reviews being cited doesn't mean anything.6 hours, whatever, it was short as fuck. that’s the point. No replay value, no trophies, it’s a shit example regardless.
Maybe, but hard to know withoutt more info.I think that 100ish million is just the development cost. The marketing would double that number
No one gives a fuck dudeNot really profitable like Pokemon and Animal Crossing.
It would make sense since the point is "the most expensive production in Netherlands", marketing doesn't fit well in this claim since aren't resorces put in the country.Maybe, but hard to know withoutt more info.
Pokemon and Animal Croing aren't really profitable like GTAV and Fortnite, so what? At each their ownRevenue = 770m
Development budget + Marketing budget = 300-400m
Not really profitable like Pokemon and Animal Crossing.
First of all, you are comparing apples to oranges. Everything was cheaper to make 25 years ago, because most industries used simpler tech and techniques to make stuff. Nowadays everything needs to be "cutting edge"(Something that deserves its own thread).$100M for a game...
IS prohibitively expensive.
Some perspective? RE2 on tePS1 cost around $1M to make. Built by like 50 people. MGSV cost around $80M, and that made Konami decide game development has become too expensive.
Since 2017 Nintendo made around 20bn of usd in profits with Switch which is higher than TakeTwo+Epic+Sony PlayStation+Konami+Capcom+Square Enix+Bandai Namco+XBOX+Sega profits since 2017 combined.Pokemon and Animal Croing aren't really profitable like GTAV and Fortnite, so what? At each their own
Since 2017 Nintendo made around 20bn of usd in profits with Switch which is higher than TakeTwo+Epic+Sony PlayStation+Konami+Capcom+Square Enix+Bandai Namco+XBOX+Sega profits since 2017 combined.
Yep, something's gotta give this cannot be sustainable.
Nice moving the goalposts you put there without a reason to begin with lolSince 2017 Nintendo made around 20bn of usd in profits with Switch which is higher than TakeTwo+Epic+Sony PlayStation+Konami+Capcom+Square Enix+Bandai Namco+XBOX+Sega profits since 2017 combined.
70x11.000.000.How so if Pokemon SV is literally at double the units Ragnarok sold and it just passed a billion in revenue?
Math ain't mathing for me.
When sony says making games are expensive. They are not just talking about themselves. They are talking about the industry at large. And even if everything was cheaper back then, doesn't change the fact that development now costs almost 100x more than it did 30 years ago. Back then, a game needed to move 1M units to be considered a success. Now the typical AAA game needs to move 2M units to just break even. And that's only if you are first party,if you are third party, that goes up to around 2.5/3M to just break even.First of all, you are comparing apples to oranges. Everything was cheaper to make 25 years ago, because most industries used simpler tech and techniques to make stuff. Nowadays everything needs to be "cutting edge"(Something that deserves its own thread).
Secondly, I never said it was cheap. 100 million is an absurd mountain of money.
But take in account this: The first game was a commercial and critical success. I think it had sold 20 MILLION copies before the sequel came out. The franchise obviously has a fanbase and a loyal following.
Now, consider that most sales nowadays are digital, making the cut that Sony takes out of each copy sold to be pretty much 100% of what it costs. And that the sequel of a critical and commercial successful game is so desirable that, even if Sony completely screwed up with the sequel's quality, it would still have sold at least 5 million units when all was said and done(TLOU 2 was a complete disaster, and that game still managed to sell 10 million+ copies in more than 2 years), and that 100 million dollars is basically around 2 million copies sold and you start noticing that, at least when it comes to prestabilished franchises, the risk ain't THAT great.
Especially nowadays that games sell for years. No scratch that. They sell for DECADES. Its like having an asset that, once produced, keeps making money on its own. And if you need to bring it to modern hardware, just pretty it up, modernize the controls, and bam. And depending on the title, you will already have a dedicated fanbase that will eat it up, market the game for you(Since its a childhood game full of cherished memories for them)if you don't completely screw it up.
So when Sony goes on record and says stuff like making games is so risky, at leas when it comes to beloved and prestabilished franchises, I look at these numbers and scratch my head a little. Because while yeah, its a lot of money, its also almost garanteed, for these big and stabilished franchises, to do well regardless of the quality, unless there were warning signs in previous titles in that same franchise. And even then, its easy to spot.
So yeah, I don't know. I get when its a new IP, like the first Horizon and Ghost of Tsushima. But for Uncharted 5? Horizon 3? Ghost of Tsushima 2? Assuming the content that people liked about the previous titles is there in the second, its just a slam dunk.
Callisto looks better but Horizon runs better.Best looking game so far this gen.
That would be a redundant experiment. Sony has almost 30+ years of game development to know exactly what it needs to make a game and how much it wud cost. Not all the games sony has made have been these super big-budget games you know.I think its really cool that they can afford such big mega productions but i would love to see them do some sort of "classic gaming" experiment. Make a smaller team and give them 10 million usd and only requirement is "make an 8-10 hs single player game in 2 years" and then if its end up being good iterate over it over the duration of a generation, you can get full trilogy that way like we used to in the past in the span of a gen. At 10 million they only need to sell 300k to make a profit, even the less selling Sony productions sell more than that. I think they could do it.
Okay maybe experiment is not the right word, call it an "experiment" as a whole to see how the devs feel about it, the press, the fans, etc.That would be a redundant experiment. Sony has almost 30+ years of game development to know exactly what it needs to make a game and how much it wud cost. Not all the games sony has made have been these super big-budget games you know.
The average annual salary for a team of 10 developers with an average salary of $90k/year is around $1M in the states. About half that in japan. But for simplicity's sake lets just stick with the $1M.
100 devs, that's $10M/year. 200 devs, $20M/year. ~4yrs dev time, $80M. You can add another $50 for marketing and stuff. So everything ends up being around $120-$130M. It is not that expensive in some countries, and not everyone would spend that kinda money on marketing. But yeah, $80-$120M is the current ballpark for a AAA game.
Point is, sony has... no, pretty much every publisher. Has akready done that before or at some point. We didn't get to these high budgets by accident or due to misappropriation of funds. We got here organically. As tech advanced, as quality went up, as game innovation improved and gamers expectations changed, what you needed to make a AAA game changed with it.Okay maybe experiment is not the right word, call it an "experiment" as a whole to see how the devs feel about it, the press, the fans, etc.
I am sure the first item on your list is factored into the salary already. As for the other two, those are under assets (be that fixed or variable assets) and aren't factored into the actual cost of a game. Eg, one studio can be making 3 games at the same time. Technically, it all falls under operation costs, but when they say cost to make game, they are usually talking about man hours and marketing.You are missing
- benefits costs (SS, Health, Retirement)
- Overhead costs (supplies, tools, electricity, hardware, etc)
- Real estate costs
So no, you need to add an overhead factor to salary, usually over 50% more
Wasn't there a whole fight at Rockstar/Take2 where they wanted to ditch single player on go all in on GTA Online?You have a link to that? Because I really doubt that claim. Take Two & Epic alone will have generated a decent lions share of profit in that timeframe with GTA Online & Fortnite. PS typically makes around $2.5 - $3.5 billion in annual profits.
So I'd think just GTA Online, Fortnite & PS net profits from that period would eclipse Nintendo's net profits. Collectively, but still. And that's before throwing in the other companies you listed. Unless again, you have a source for the claim.
That's partly what the live-service games are for: to produce a recurring revenue stream through MTX & DLC content sales that can help sustain development of the big marquee AAA games.
Other developments will help too, like AI-powered programming & development models, and maybe even new alternative funding & investment business models.
I am sure the first item on your list is factored into the salary already.
Wasn't there a whole fight at Rockstar/Take2 where they wanted to ditch single player on go all in on GTA Online?
ut at the same time, the industry is several times larger than it was back then. Not only there are more people buying more games, but gaming is more accepted than ever. We can even say it reached mainstream status. SDo while the cap for most games was in a few millions, now that same cap for most successful games are in the dozens of millions.When sony says making games are expensive. They are not just talking about themselves. They are talking about the industry at large. And even if everything was cheaper back then, doesn't change the fact that development now costs almost 100x more than it did 30 years ago. Back then, a game needed to move 1M units to be considered a success. Now the typical AAA game needs to move 2M units to just break even. And that's only if you are first party,if you are third party, that goes up to around 2.5/3M to just break even.
Not everyone is sony or MS, there are clearly becoming fewer and fewer companies wing to invest in 3-4 AAA games/year now. Even the biggest publishers these days are mostly limited to one or two such games a year. And we are getting fewer and fewer new IPs each generation because as you have pointed out, only the established IPs are worth risking money on.
That price tag, as easy as you may think it is to recoup, is the reason why.
We found the Nintendo supporter/shareholder.Since 2017 Nintendo made around 20bn of usd in profits with Switch which is higher than TakeTwo+Epic+Sony PlayStation+Konami+Capcom+Square Enix+Bandai Namco+XBOX+Sega profits since 2017 combined.
I don't doubt they know exactly what kind of game they can make with smaller teams and less budget, all im saying is that i would like to see them do it on top of their usual AAA stuff, so we can get more experimental stuff or get a bunch of sequels in the same gen and not wait 5 years each time.Point is, sony has... no, pretty much every publisher. Has akready done that before or at some point. We didn't get to these high budgets by accident or due to misappropriation of funds. We got here organically. As tech advanced, as quality went up, as game innovation improved and gamers expectations changed, what you needed to make a AAA game changed with it.
It's kind of like meeting a contractor and asking him what kinda house you can make for $50k. They usually can tell you exactly what that money would get you before you even break ground.
I do get what you are saying, and why. I just feel it would be them wasting resources or being redundant. It's not like they have unlimited resources.I don't doubt they know exactly what kind of game they can make with smaller teams and less budget, all im saying is that i would like to see them do it on top of their usual AAA stuff, so we can get more experimental stuff or get a bunch of sequels in the same gen and not wait 5 years each time.
$80-100M is production cost alone. Double that and add some with marketing. That's the ballpark for most AAA games. Big ones like Cyberpunk are very likely $200M+ in production alone but these are the exception, not the norm.
Marketing costs a lot of money and it's not rare to see the marketing budget match or sometimes exceed the production budget. Cyberpunk for instance had reportedly a production budget of 174M but a marketing budget of 142M. According to the LA Times, the marketing budget for COD MW2 was $200M.Marketing is certainly not an equal part of the game's budget in this case. $30 to $50 millions (and that's pushing it) I could see, but not the $100+ millions you're suggesting.
It's a ps4 game so i wouldn't say current gen.Best looking game so far this gen.
It's a ps4 game so i wouldn't say current gen.
I mostly agree with most of those complaints. But I'd say the game is still better than the first.I'm dissapointed with FW and even more considering 110$ million cost, playing at the moment and i'm more then halfway through in total progress and i'm having hard time enjoying it imo it feels like game was rushed to release and it lacked time to polish, i know it may sound bit like a rant but i just wan't to adress issues it has and it has really annoying bugs/issues like:
Button prompt sometimes doesn't work and it requires you to restart a game and it's inacurate.
Weapons, armor could be more diverse now only difference is it's status.
Lightning at brief moments sometimes looks way to bright i don't know is that some glitch or that suppose to happen.
Grapling hook mechanics could be better you can go down when you suppose to go up with grapling hook while climbing.
Climbing mechanics could be better, more responsive specially when alloy suddenly decides to climb in middle of the fight and it doesn't wan't to let go.
AI is like in the most games is dumb.
Machines in game world is cramped together and it's really annoying when every 5 seconds everyone attacks you like in the first game.
Facial animations are inconsistent sometimes it really looks good and sometimes is bad.
Focus sometimes doesn't show everything you can climb on but that's rare occasion but frustating one.
Item looting could be better, i just looting everyone and don't even try to look at items i've got because there's to much of it and i know i won't run out of anything items feels insignificant i'm playing on normal and i've already maxed out my puoches without have to kill any animal, don't even try to fully upgrade my gear because why? i've no trouble dealling with machines.
Voice over for alloy is to much she shouldn't constalnty speak about mundane things i do in world i mean i'm nitpicking but it could get annoying.
Melee combat is bad like in first game it could be way better if it had lock on target and these melle pit chellenges are stupid and unnecessary who's is trying to remember these moves? i mean it's not tekken, simplicity should be the key here.
Soundtrack doesn't need to play same track over and over it should play once it drive me crazy when these sad strings plays over and over or battle music plays even there's nothing to fight with i know i could mute it but then you miss good tracks which btw zero dawn have way better OST.
So far i prefer Ragnarok, Demon Souls or even Rift apart over FW.
$100M for a game...
IS prohibitively expensive.
Some perspective? RE2 on tePS1 cost around $1M to make. Built by like 50 people. MGSV cost around $80M, and that made Konami decide game development has become too expensive.
So if a game costs $150mil total budget, how many units will they need to sell at full price ($70) for break even? Does anyone know? This would be subtracting the retailer/publisher and platform holder cut from the $70.
I find it kinda baffling in 2023 and so much coverage of the games industry this is still hard to find out.