Indie game Luftrausers took 2.5 years to make, becomes profitable in 72 hours

Ridiculous Fishing developer Vlambeer's latest game, Luftrausers, took two-and-a-half years to develop, but needed only 72 hours to become profitable. Vlambeer announced the news in a thank-you message posted on the company's official Twitter account.

"Luftrausers just became profitable," Vlambeer said on March 21, just three days after the game's debut for PC and PlayStation Network on March 18. "It had a two-and-a-half year development cycle. We are super overwhelmed and thankful."

By comparison, some big-budget AAA games never achieve profitability or can take months or longer to make back their development costs, as was the case with the Tomb Raider reboot. Of course, AAA games are normally built by 100 or more developers, while Vlambeer is a two-man studio consisting of Rami Ismail and Jan Willem Nijman.

Luftrausers is a 2D, arcade-style air combat game where you fly around and lay waste to enemy planes. The game normally sells for $10, but Steam is running a promotion today where it's available for $9. For more, check out GameSpot's review.