I think every game developers should release their development cost budget

[eriol33]

so gamers, pirates have more respect on the final products, putting the video games in the same respect to hollywood movies.

Back then when I was kid I pirated games without thinking it was expensive to develop (well I live in developing countries where games are expensive). however these days I hardly pirate video games and tried to redeem myself by buying the games I have pirated.

what do you think? or perhaps it's not really good idea?

 

[Xenon Hacks]

so gamers, pirates have more respect on the final products, putting the video games in the same respect to hollywood movies.

Back then when I was kid I pirated games without thinking it was expensive to develop (well I live in developing countries where games are expensive). however these days I hardly pirate video games and tried to redeem myself by buying the games I have pirated.

what do you think? or perhaps it's not really good idea?

No because the bigger your budget is the better than product "can" be, setting a budget stifles and limits innovation if you hit your budget.

 

[FAST6191]

"so pirates"


Also I am supposed to respect Hollywood's output?

 

[Taleweaver]

so gamers, pirates have more respect on the final products, putting the video games in the same respect to hollywood movies.

So...you're saying I should lower the respect I have for video games because I have to hold them to the same standards as "LOOK AT THIS ONE MILLION DOLLAR WORTH OF EXPLOSIONS!!!!"-hollywood movies?

Back then when I was kid I pirated games without thinking it was expensive to develop (well I live in developing countries where games are expensive). however these days I hardly pirate video games and tried to redeem myself by buying the games I have pirated.

what do you think? or perhaps it's not really good idea?

The irony is that nowadays, it's much cheaper to actually create games. Back to up to the early nineties, you had to start from complete scratch roughly every time. If there were common engines out, they were either inhouse developed or sold at insane costs for what they gave. In the mid- to late nineties that got better as 3D engines became both more versatile, user-friendly and not as expensive. And nowadays? The Unreal 4 engine is free to use and I got 2 game creator engines on freakin' humble bundles. Porting to other platforms has become exponentially easier as well.

The flipside, however, is that standards have continuously risen. AAA-titles still costs fortunes to make because the engines still needs tweaking, a crapton of cutscenes have to be recorded, there's a huge cast of voice actors, animators, musicians, and so on. And let's not forget probably the largest money-sink: marketing.

To be honest, releasing development cost budget would only show the massive disparity between huge game studios and indie studios. And pirates? They'll just keep pirating.

Oh, and a final note: money isn't the only thing that goes into the development cost. Time is an equal, if not larger, factor.

 

[Tom Bombadildo]

Most of the time, for AAA games anyways, you can actually find development costs (or best estimates) around online. And Taleweaver is absolutely right, AAA costs are still super high and marketing the game usually ends up costing as much if not more than the actual development costs. For example, Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 (which, according to various sources, is the most expensive game developed) cost ~$50 million to develop...with a whole goddamn $200 million sunk into marketing.

For older games, sitting at number 3, FF7 cost $45 million to make and Square spent $100 million on marketing. Shenmue sits at $47 million and $23 million for marketing.

 

[RevPokemon]

Most of the time, for AAA games anyways, you can actually find development costs (or best estimates) around online. And Taleweaver is absolutely right, AAA costs are still super high and marketing the game usually ends up costing as much if not more than the actual development costs. For example, Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 (which, according to various sources, is the most expensive game developed) cost ~$50 million to develop...with a whole goddamn $200 million sunk into marketing.

For older games, sitting at number 3, FF7 cost $45 million to make and Square spent $100 million on marketing. Shenmue sits at $47 million and $23 million for marketing.

Well some of shenmues money went ultimately for the sequel plus with older games we have to consider inflation and what not.

But your right you can pretty much find the price for newer popular games or a good estimate.

 

[LaronX]

No because the bigger your budget is the better than product "can" be, setting a budget stifles and limits innovation if you hit your budget.

Not to mention you might go though stuff that will be scrapped and never be in the game. Consider you'd make a budget for FFXV. 10 years of development and 3 iterations of that the game was supposed to be ( first FFXIII versus ) and you quickly get a budget that seems stupendous. On the other hand only a certain amount of that is actually in the end product. All helped achieve it but that work put in the other games is wasted.

Not to mention you can be EA or Ubisoft and just suck and budgeting games ( or lie to make it seem bigger)