If game costs keep getting higher, what will happen to us?

Had to get this off my chest.

The Game development bessiness is expensive. Everybody knows that.

But what I want to know is...If development costs keep getting higher...What will happen to the industry? What will happen to us?

If your a game company, you have to spend money on stuff like this.

• Workers. (Corporate.)

• Game Devs.

• Bills. (Light bill, Water bill, etc.)

• Rent and/or Taxes.

• Health insurance. (So I hear)

• Marketing.

• Shipping.

• Equipment.

If I'm missing anything, feel free to let me know.

(Source: Calculator) If you have a dev team of...10 people, and your paying them $15 an hour, for...11 hours, that's $1,650a day. Times 7 days is $11,550. Times a month is 57,750. Times a year is 693,000. That's just ONE dev team. If you multiplay that times, let's say...6 teams, that's freaking $4,158,000, (Over 4 million), A YEAR. That's not counting the bills, taxes, and other costs. Now imagine if you paid the team more tha $15 an hour. Those numbers are insane. I'm that's probably not even the half of it.

If the cost for making games keeps getting higher, what will companies do to keep making money? Are they going to charge us $80 for base games? $40 for DLC that they cut out of the game? Charge microtransactions for every level? Charge for extra crap that you don't need? How much are the consoles going to cost? What happens if a game bombs and companies lose money?

In order to make sure the game sells, companies will stick to what sales...In other words, more rehashes and yearly releases. The fact that most people these days are greedy and just want to stick money in their pocket doesn't help the problem.

Going down the road, what's going to happen to us? Is the digital future really inevitable? Something needs to be done.

Moved to Games Discussion =)

@korvus: Ok. Was going to put it System Wars, but I wasn't sure if it was the right kind of topic.

as i see it, we just get more epic games. if the price doesn't match the quality/amount of content, it just doesn't sell, and the studio goes down with massive losses.

ultimately, only those business models will survive that customers are willing to pay from. market economy is self-balancing thing. what doesn't sell, dies.

...I get what your saying. I most cases, that's true. But when I look at games like Evolve, Destiny and Titanfall, I think otherwise.

Nothing...... people will just keep buying them ..... business as usual.

I agree with those concerns, but everywhere you look the cost of living goes up. Tale as old as time. With things like SharePlay or Twitch, at least we'll be able to see how the game is in real time to make an informed purchase.

My only gripe is this new trend of selling incomplete games and having to purchase so-called "expansion packs" for the "full game experience." I'm willing to deal with the growing cost of games, but within reason.

well, those kind of games will not be the future, unless they prove to be successful, wich i doubt. i bet Dota 2 is making tons more money. it only needs a couple of succesful games that do it better, and suddenly everyone starts to demand that better business model.

it's a rocky road to the better future. have faith, bro.

i'm personally willing to pay more from games to compensate the financial effort put into them, but i also need great gameplay. hollywood visuals still don't make the game.

Good topic, and one that is rarely discussed in a civil fashion anywhere on the internet (or otherwise).

To me, the solution for the future lies in a very From Software-like development model. Lower those budgets, focus on the things that make games, games, and everyone wins. Chasing the spectacle and visual sheen of the latest summer popcorn flick would likely bury most of the industry eventually, because there are only a handful of publishers out there that can (barely) shoulder the burden of AAA-development anymore, and even they have resorted to unfriendly business practices to make the most of their massive investments, like day-one DLC.

Regardless of my thoughts on a solution (because who am I but a gamer with no more industry information that the next guy) I can say this: I'm willing to pay $80-100 for a solid, content-packed new release, and I'm sure a lot of people feel the same way. What I'm not willing to do is pay that much, as a flat rate, for any new physical release irrespective of the content on offer. Something like The Order 1886 needs to be priced according to its paltry offering of a couple of movies worth of enjoyment.

Down the line I see the physical format dying in favor of digital copies in order to cut cost a bit, it's rather convenient in a way especially for the portable market but I suppose on the other hand better hardware will be needed or customers will have to always be provided a means to redownload no matter how old a platform gets which is why an ios like format is needed across all platforms so no matter what system you're on your games are there to be re-downloaded

i think the realm of the big budget game is going to continue to reduce to fewer and fewer publishers. for some games the budget can be whatever the hell the publisher wants.

GTA6 will probably cost around 500,000,000 (i think thats half a billion...maybe missing a zero :P). its an insane amount of money. but tis safe money. GTA will make back a BEEP load more than half a billion. same with COD (for now).

its basically going to boil down to activision, ubisoft and EA by the end of gen i think. the likes of square and capcom wont be able to outspend them.

however the other side we are going to see, i think, is something between the indie game and the AAA game. something ranging from the 10 to the 50 million mark in terms of budget. not small money but not enough to match a AAA budget. but it would be enough to make some interesting games and still somewhat flex the tech.

When everybody jumps on the Digital-Only train they will not just cut the cost, they will benefit hugely cause nobody will be able to resell their games! So i'm not that worried about the price og a game in the future.

I'm also in the minority of not hating DLC or MT! Of course only if it's done the right way and not D1DLC! A good example could be GTA V, here you can get as much money you'll like through MT, but you'll still have to level up to open up for things that really matter in the game. I'm totally down with that because that meant I could get an apartment, nice cars etc. without grinding like hell just to look good! I'm at that age where I don't have the time to sit in front of my PS4 for 5 hours every day, so can I get a little help from Rockstar and Rockstar get a little more of my money I'd say it's a good deal...

$15/hour?! Well you wouldn't be hiring anyone with technical skill for that kind of pay. Average salary is $83,000 for developers (~$40/hour for a 40 hour work week).

There no winning for the gaming companies. The companies raise the cost then gamers scream how sadistic the companies are. The companies low the quality of the games then gamers scream how sadistic the companies are. The companies make DLC then gamers scream how sadistic the companies are.

There are reasons that company want digital only method. It gives the game companies so much power even after he game is purchases.

On the other side, the indie games are not much better. They are flooding the market with game that are not top and not innovative just like before the US game crash.

@Lulu_Lulu: That is exactly what I thought. Nothing will happen. People will keep spending. If kids will pay god awful amounts of money for cell phones, sneakers, ripped up jeans, what makes games any different? When I like a game and it has a special edition that has all sorts of fun things in it, I buy it despite is huge price tag.

@Jjinne:

Me too....... and then I don't even play it. :(