A new Video Game Crash? Bring it on!

Hi, System Wars! I found a new interesting article- it DOES have pie graphs for those who care :P

FFD: Is Next-Gen gaming sustainable?

The cost of making triple A games is beyond ludicrous. In the last generation of console games, the PlayStation 2 era, the average cost of developing a blockbuster game was between one and four million US dollars. By 2010, the average cost of development had risen to above 20 million dollars ? discounting games with ridiculous budgets, like Grand Theft Auto 4 ($100M), Gran Turismo 5 ($80M), L.A noire ($50M) and APB($50M). That?s without factoring in marketing budgets.

That is a staggering amount of money ? and explains why some games, even though they sell a million plus copies, fail to make any money. Asset creation, voice recording, engine development and human capital and graphics rendering all cost a fortune ? and their costs are only going to increase exponentially with the next generation of hardware. We could see games costing in excess of $100 million ? and the only way for publishers and developers to make money is to sell multiple millions of copies of their games ? and then pad them out with DLC, or go the free-to-play route, nickle-and-diming consumers for everything they?re worth.

Taking risks and launching new IP is already the sort of thing that can leave a developer in tatters if it underperforms. Based on current game prices, the average $20 million dollar game ? not taking marketing in to account ? would have to sell 750 000 copies just to break even. A $100M next-gen game would have to sell just under 4 million copies to even start making any money ? and those sort of sales tend to be reserved for sequels to established blockbusters, like Call of Duty. It?s incredibly likely that we?ll see nothing but the sort of stuff that publishers think will sell ? First person shooters, shoe-horned multiplayer and poor Skyrim clones ? next gen.

The question is ? will next-gen development costs make videogames unsustainable? are we set for another giant crash, like we saw in 1983?

I'm probably going to come off as a bit of a nuthead when I say this but: Bring it on! Another giant video game crash is exactly what we need!

1) It'll give me more time to catch up on all the very many games I missed out on :D

2) I believe this will lead to even more support going to the amazing indie-developers

3) The last time this happened it led to a brand new revolution (The NES). This, I think, is exactly what the industry needs

Are YOU excited for the Video Game Crash of 2015?! (Date is just a placeholder) Also, for the sake of discussion, answer the article's quetion.

This is why consoles need to focus more on DD next gen. Cut out the middle man retailers that collect money from the sales by limiting the amount of physical copies that are put out into distribution. This would also will decrease used game sales. Offer incentives for buying digital copies rather than physical ($5-$10 cheaper for example). Have sales similar to Steam Sales where people can pick up games that they were unsure of when they initially released. If they like the game, chances are they will buy the sequel when it is released.

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We will never see a crash like 1982/1983 again. It was very different back then. Today you have 3 consoles. Back then you had around 8-10, maybe even more. What caused the crash was mostly Atari's fault. Primarily 2 games caused the crash: Pac-man and ET for the Atari.

Atari make more copies of Pac-man then there were Atari system out. When it didn't sell well, it was a major loss.

ET was the worst offender. Atari made millions and millions of ET copies hoping for a good holiday sale (they rushed the game to make it in time for christmas, basically a 6-8 month development cycle for the game). People bought it and found that it was such a bad game, most people returned the game causing Atari to lose big time.

You will never see that again. It cannot possibly happen again.

This is why Sony is turning to cloud gaming and party games for the PS4.

This is why consoles need to focus more on DD next gen. Cut out the middle man retailers that collect money from the sales by limiting the amount of physical copies that are put out into distribution. This would also will decrease used game sales. Offer incentives for buying digital copies rather than physical ($5-$10 cheaper for example). Have sales similar to Steam Sales where people can pick up games that they were unsure of when they initially released. If they like the game, chances are they will buy the sequel when it is released.

BPoole96

This is what I think should happen too. It's going to happen eventually, if not now. The PS3 already has a respectable amount of retail games up for download. Pretty big titles like LBP, Uncharted, COD (I think), and Mass Effect.

My body is ready.

My body is ready.

LordQuorthon

This is why Sony is turning to cloud gaming and party games for the PS4.

groverslanding

Anything wrong with that? Sony will likely have their console and have Gaikai as a game streaming service that is optional for people if they choose to go that route rather than buying physical copies and making trips to Gamestop every week or waiting for their new game to come in from Gamefly.

I cant believe anyone is actually hoping for a crash, what the hells wrong with you?!?!?!?! Another gaming crash would not be a good thing for anyone anywhere and you're a naive idiot if you think otherwise, an entire industry of developers, publishers etc etc losing their jobs and more is a good thing is it??:roll::roll:

The main reason costs went up this generation was the jump to HD, it does cost more to make and build assets for HD consoles yes however now that infrastructure is in place costs shouldnt go up by such a huge amount and with developers more tuned in to what it takes to build a game for HD consoles the whole process should (not be easier, that would be naive) but more straightforward now they have a grasp on the technicalitites involved.

Seeing that graph, as much as I hate to say goodbye to physical discs, the middle man really needs to be cut out of the equation.

I cant believe anyone is actually hoping for a crash, what the hells wrong with you?!?!?!?! Another gaming crash would not be a good thing for anyone anywhere and you're a naive idiot if you think otherwise, an entire industry of developers, publishers etc etc losing their jobs and more is a good thing is it??:roll::roll:

The main reason costs went up this generation was the jump to HD, it does cost more to make and build assets for HD consoles yes however now that infrastructure is in place costs shouldnt go up by such a huge amount and with developers more tuned in to what it takes to build a game for HD consoles the whole process should (not be easier, that would be naive) but more straightforward now they have a grasp on the technicalitites involved.

l34052

Why the flying **** would the most important thing in a video game market crash, of all things, be developers losing their jobs?

The returns are higher now than they were during the cartridge days.

@OP

Please don't mention Prototype devs of all people. The first game was one of the worst things I played in 2009. If that was a "well developed and enjoyable to play" game, then I weep for the low standards of that article's writer.

On topic, a fresh breath of new ideas would totally be a good thing, however it's only this gen of consoles that sucked so freaking hard. I'd rather wait to see if the market can pull it together before saying we need a new crash.

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D4W1L4H

Middleware is the key to keeping budgets low. What most devs do is make one crazy engine then reuse that over and over and over again. So maybe on the 1st game they will spend $50 million, but the next game will be like only $10mil. LIke FFXII must've cost alot to make, but FFXII-2 must have been cheap in comparison.

Let's talk worst case scenario.

All 3 of the big video game companies magically lose the will to create any video games for their gigantic market.

Free to play, PC, and digital games will continue to be made. The simple fact that everyone has/needs/wants a PC or Mac. That install base alone can sustain a video game market.

It simply is not possible for there to be a video game crash unless every single consumer of video games died tomorrow and nobody knew how to program them anymore. Also, we would have to go through and destroy every artifact and item affiliated with video games, both past and present.

The only way that this could ever possibly happen would be if there was a massive medical discovery that video games gave you some kind of incurable disease that started wiping people out at an epidemic pace.

I simply cannot think of any practical way that video games could be eliminated from our society today. COD is as American as beer, the markets for foreign countries is exploding, the video game market has surpassed just about everyone and everything in every other entertainment market, and the side effects of video games are non-existent.

Yeah I don't see a video game crash happening in the future. It'll evolve for sure, but I foresee video games existing as long as the human race does.

Hi, System Wars! I found a new interesting article- it DOES have pie graphs for those who care :P

FFD: Is Next-Gen gaming sustainable?

The cost of making triple A games is beyond ludicrous. In the last generation of console games, the PlayStation 2 era, the average cost of developing a blockbuster game was between one and four million US dollars. By 2010, the average cost of development had risen to above 20 million dollars ? discounting games with ridiculous budgets, like Grand Theft Auto 4 ($100M), Gran Turismo 5 ($80M), L.A noire ($50M) and APB($50M). That?s without factoring in marketing budgets.

That is a staggering amount of money ? and explains why some games, even though they sell a million plus copies, fail to make any money. Asset creation, voice recording, engine development and human capital and graphics rendering all cost a fortune ? and their costs are only going to increase exponentially with the next generation of hardware. We could see games costing in excess of $100 million ? and the only way for publishers and developers to make money is to sell multiple millions of copies of their games ? and then pad them out with DLC, or go the free-to-play route, nickle-and-diming consumers for everything they?re worth.

Taking risks and launching new IP is already the sort of thing that can leave a developer in tatters if it underperforms. Based on current game prices, the average $20 million dollar game ? not taking marketing in to account ? would have to sell 750 000 copies just to break even. A $100M next-gen game would have to sell just under 4 million copies to even start making any money ? and those sort of sales tend to be reserved for sequels to established blockbusters, like Call of Duty. It?s incredibly likely that we?ll see nothing but the sort of stuff that publishers think will sell ? First person shooters, shoe-horned multiplayer and poor Skyrim clones ? next gen.

The question is ? will next-gen development costs make videogames unsustainable? are we set for another giant crash, like we saw in 1983?

I'm probably going to come off as a bit of a nuthead when I say this but: Bring it on! Another giant video game crash is exactly what we need!

1) It'll give me more time to catch up on all the very many games I missed out on :D

2) I believe this will lead to even more support going to the amazing indie-developers

3) The last time this happened it led to a brand new revolution (The NES). This, I think, is exactly what the industry needs

Are YOU excited for the Video Game Crash of 2015?! (Date is just a placeholder) Also, for the sake of discussion, answer the article's quetion.

simomate

If it means better business practices and a return to core gaming then I wouldn't mind missing half a decade of games. senses_fail_06

a doomcult

theres not any chance there will be another catastrophic crash.