Remedy: The Traditional AAA Single Player Experience Is Really Expensive To Make, Costs Went Up 10x

Remedy Entertainment's Head of Communication Thomas Puha openly stated that the traditional AAA single player experience is really expensive to make now as costs have gone up tenfold, suggesting that's part of why Remedy is now looking to add cooperative multiplayer to its new games.

[Jackhass]

We're definitely coming to a crossroads where "story or cutting-edge graphics/tech" may be a choice we have to make more often.

[Deep-throat]

What the hell am I reading? Story or graphics tech, that is it? You talk like a suit who never played a game.

Stop wasting money on celebs or writers. The industry needs more creative people who enjoy playing games, not suits. From Software is a great example on why gaming need more creative game designers, not cinephiles.

[Godmars290]

Celebs you mean. They need writers.

[Nitrowolf2]

Maybe if they didn't invest in live-action cutscenes and a few other unnecessary things cost wouldn't be so High

[NecrumOddBoy]

Agreed.

Uncharted had no name actors and they became famous with the series.

Heavy Rain had no celebs and was incredible. Beyond Two Souls has major celebs and was a bomb.

It's all about having something good. If you feel you need to fork half of your budget to Samuel L. Jackson to get attention, then you are missing the point and wasting massive cash from the budget.

[thekhurg]

Remedy are just MS pawns. CD Projekt Red made Witcher 3 for substantially less than QB, Ryse, The Order 1886, etc... And it's one of the best single player games of all time, and their engine was no slouch.

Single player games are justifiable and profitable when you're not under the oppressive micro-transaction thumb of a MS, EA or Activision.

[Fist4achin]

I never understood using celebrities for their voice. I get wanting them bc people know the voice, but there are tons of other people who could use the work and probably do it for much less.

Same with cartoons and animation.

[Godmars290]

"I never understood using celebrities for their voice."

Audience draw, same as with big budget movies. The exact same mentality that goes into as as short 80 minute movie applied to an at least 10 interactive work.

Which is probably why SP games have become as short as 4 hours and less.

[Rachel_Alucard]

@Godmars

Publishers still believe attaching names on a cover attracts people like what movies do with their covers. But in reality no soccer mom/old senior/anyone outside the demographic would ever buy a video game just because some famous celebrity they like is in it. Too stuck in the past.

While we're at it let's make a new electronic battleship board game and have Leonardo DiCaprio as the narrator. That will get everyone buying it.

[Godmars290]

"Publishers still believe attaching names on a cover attracts people"

Exactly. The same publishers who often rush games and have mandated DLC and MTs. Who strive to make games assembly-line product and value market research over artistic or entertainment value.

[LandoCalrissiano]

"nobody outside the demo would ever buy a game because of a celebrity". Normand Reedus and death stranding? Guarantee you thousands are gonna buy because they are walking dead fans.

[CrimsonIdol]

"Normand Reedus and death stranding? Guarantee you thousands are gonna buy because they are walking dead fans." - They aren't going to be buying for *that* celebrity. There's another celebrity in the credits that is 100% carrying that game however... "a H____ K_____ game"

[-Foxtrot]

Yeah exactly

Celebs
Live action cutscenes
TV show elements
Different choices means longer script
Pushing graphics

It’s there own design choices to why it went up so much. Are they stupid? This was their fault, they chose to do this.

[bouzebbal]

you feel the investment even more when the game turns out bad.

[fiveby9]

The great SP games of times past did not have expensive celebs, writers, etc. The medium doesn't need these expensive people to be successful. For example, why in the world did CoD have Kevin Spacey years ago. Unnecessary. An SP game like Zelda BotW didn't need all the overhead. Hollywood influence. We just don't need them. The 'traditional' SP game is not one which has expensive hollywood type writers, actors, etc.

[Kumakai]

It’s not talent that’s the biggest cost. It’s man hours developing, designing, modeling, addition of motion capture, third party tools (like havoc engine physics or physX). Game developers often work long hard hours and someone has to pay them for 12-16 hour crunch days. There’s also cost in distribution, publishing, advertising is more expensive now, there’s media cost etc. (media buys are ways more expensive now). Literally the costs for everything have gone up while game prices have stayed flat at $60. That’s why people are throwing in so many MTs and focusing on games as a service etc. Studios need more revenue. Some like RA took it too far but it’s a symptom of a larger problem. Th reality is game prices will go up if MTs becomes too hot button.

More detail means more work. More work means more cost. Period. Horizon zero dawn cost a hell of a lot more to make than Starfox 64 and I think we can see why.

don’t sound so naive when you think you know what you are talking about. I actually work in the industry. EA and Activision are literally across the street from me.

[Lon3wolf]

Not sure on that, plenty of indie devs have managed both on a limited budget.

[TheVigilanteCode]

Reminds me of Hellblade being a recent example of this.

[UltraNova]

Hellblade was a 10x better game than QB with a 10x smaller budget.

Excuses and missinformation on the other hand are free.

[TekoIie]

@Jackhass

I don't think it's that simple of a tradeoff.

Story tends to be a case of how far the studio leads want to go with the plot/narrative and how talented a team of writers you can get but even then things can fall flat. Then there's the rising cost of voice actors and I'd be willing to bet your average AAA has more VAs than they did maybe 10 years ago.

Probably doesn't help that they're having to develop Xbox One X and PS4 PRO enhancements as well but I'd see that as a minor addition to the workload devs already have. Dare I say that it's time the West take a loot at how Japan is able to make so many good games and have them be successful without even hitting 1 mil in sales?

[remixx116]

Part of it is just dumb direction, you don't need a million writers and hella big name voice actors to produce a good single player experience.

Look at games like dark souls, Breath of the wild, hellblade, nierautomata, super Mario oddysee, gravity rush 2 and nioh. All amazing single player games that focus more on the artistic and gameplay aspects of their game and less on overpriced voice actors, cutting edge visuals and over cooked writing.

Games like gravity rush 2 I enjoyed so much this year just because it seems like the devs just had fun making it and didn't stress over the little shit. Breath of the wild shares the same concept it's just fun for the player.

The only writing heavy game I enjoyed this year was the stylish persona 5.

[Petebloodyonion]

@NecrumOddBoy
"Uncharted had no name actors and they became famous for the series"
Are you joking? Nolan North, Troy Baker, Robin Atkin Downes just to name a few.

@ thekhurg
Last I checked 81 million to make a game like Witcher 3 is a huge cost
http://www.pcgamer.com/the-...

And here some concrete evidence to back up Remedy claims
https://www.cnet.com/news/e...

[IGiveHugs2NakedWomen]

@Jackhass

That's ridiculous. Ninja Theory prove you and that silly comment in the article WRONG with Hellblade. In the original source article, the guy from remedy admitted to hiring an outside studio to help make Quantum Break which added to the cost of development. Skill and Efficiency is the name of the game.

[fenome]

Art styles can can carry games really far as opposed to cutting edge graphics. File sizes are usually a lot smaller too. Chasing ultra realism is a money and resource dump that hogs up huge amounts of space.

[DillyDilly]

Or how about not make games where they constantly restart over adding to the budget etc ? Its the same with Hollywood movies going over budget with bad planning

[DillyDilly]

All games have a set budget & if a game goes over budget thats their fault not ours

[Christopher]

No, we're not. We're coming to a crossroad where developers either need to stop wasting money on talent and alternative storytelling systems that waste money that could have been spent on development or accept that it's going to cost them a lot more. I'd also say that a lot of their development time was spent trying to design around the XBO limitations to make a blockbuster looking game rather than being given an easier base model system to work off of that didn't result in 'behind the curtain' magic work to hide the low resolution base.

Tons of SP games don't have these issues, some using more advanced tech concepts (HZD, The Witcher) and many looking focusing on the experience itself (Zelda, Mario, Persona, Nier, etc.) while still looking good for current generation hardware.

[rainslacker]

Meanwhile, Sony produced horizon for around 49 million. If they can manage it at that price with the amount of media included, then so can others. I don't know what cost have gone up 10 fold that remedy is talking about, but I'd imagine it was in the marketing budget, which was quite extensive for qb

[sigrid]

How does adding co-op make a game cheaper? Are they trying to say that if Quantum Break had co-op it would have been cheaper to make?

I guess what he is really trying to say is they are going to make a really small game with tons of MT's.

[KaiPow]

Only thing I could think of is being able to sacrifice graphical fidelity and not have to spend as much time on texture mapping and modelling. Well, for couch co-op that is.

[Lennoxb63]

I don't think they're saying adding multiplayer would make QB cheaper. Just that multiplayer is cheaper than single player in general. For multiplayer all you need to pay for is game testers or just release a alpha/beta. Story focused games you have to pay for voice actors, possibly motion capture, and the writers have to write a lot more.

[Alexious]

It's not that it makes the game cheaper, it's the exact other way around...People stick around longer and, therefore, revenue is increased.

[sigrid]

Yea, I understand, that's why I mentioned MT's.

[UltraNova]

Today revenue that could have been made is filed under cost. Thats right *could!

Pathetic...

[gangsta_red]

They didn't say anything of the sort.

From what I read from the article they're just stating how single player games have gone up in cost.

That even though the player base have remained the same these same players are expecting more, more levels, more time spent, better graphics, he goes on to say that all this adds up and has gone up throughout the years.

[sigrid]

Yea, I read the article. What he is actually doing is making excuses for why their next game is multiplayer and not single player. And what I am saying is it doesn't matter if the game is multiplayer or single player, what matters is how good the game is.

Quantum Break didn't fail because it didn't have multiplayer it failed because people didn't like it. And plenty of companies made successful single player games last year (Zelda, Persona, Nie,r Nioh, Yakuza, Horizon to name a small fraction). So it's not that single player doesn't work, it just didn't work for them.

[Rachel_Alucard]

@sigrid

Funny every game you listed is Japanese developed. I wonder if there's a correlation between how the west develops games and how the east develops.

[Petebloodyonion]

@sigrid
And what's the development cost for the games you just mentioned?
Nintendo acknowledge that they needed to sell 2 million Zelda games just to break even so in what way is REMEDY wrong about single player's game cost increasing a lot since a couple year?

And can ppl stop with QB and excuses, that game was funded by MS and Remedy develop it as MS intended it.

[gangsta_red]

"What he is actually doing is making excuses for why their next game is multiplayer and not single player."

He's not making any excuses and your reply is far different from your point you originally posted.

There has also been a lot of SP games that failed so just naming a few of the obvious popular ones doesn't really disproves his points.

[sigrid]

Yea, lots of games fail regardless of single player or multiplayer, that's why I said this.

"And what I am saying is it doesn't matter if the game is multiplayer or single player, what matters is how good the game is."

[1-pwnsause-1]

Cheaper cause of the micro transaction abilities you can add to it

I think of co op games like a way out and I know right off the bat it’s gonna be shit. Which is sad cause there are co op games that are good

[nibblo]

I think what they are trying to say is more people will buy it if it has coop or multiplayer so they recoup more of their costs so for them it ends up being cheaper to make a game. As long as adding those features doesn't affect the single player detrimentally I have no problem with that.

[KingKionic]

Of course because single player ONLY games are not the majority of games played.

Thanks to the rise of online gaming multiplayer gaming is the bastion of gaming now.

[RommyReigns]

'bastion of gaming'? More like 'almighty dollar worshipping corporates and publishers fleecing consumers for yearly fads'. True gaming experiences will keep gaming alive, not these glorified pay-2-win services disguised as 'games'.

[Michiel1989]

There are enough multiplayer games that don't require microtransactions or subs, and multiplayer games are more popular than single player games in this day and age. CS:Go, Overwatch, Dota 2 etc are all great examples of multiplayer games that are not p2w and constantly keep growing in popularity.

Just because some games do lootboxes wrong doesn't mean all do. I've put 3600 hours into dota2 and the only thing I bought were the International compendiums which don't give any advantage whatsoever and never did I have any disadvantage.

You can't deny multiplayer games are more popular than singleplayer games nowadays. The rapidly increasing esports scene also contributes a lot to this.

[KingKionic]

Theres nothing to argue with my statement it is reality.

I mean why is it so hard for people to accept.

Havent the developers of prominent single player only games dropping off and moving to multiplayer wasnt enough sign.

The hours spent on games are massively in multiplayer games favor in gaming.

[sigrid]

Multiplayer isn't going to make a bad game sell better. And you only have to look at last gen where every game from Batman to Tomb Raider had multiplayer and what happened people played it for a month or two then the servers were empty.

Look at all the Overwatch wanna be games that have all crashed and burned. Multiplayer is hardly the salvation people are claiming, make a good game people will buy it make a bad game it will fail.

[AspiringProGenji]

^^ so much this

Even look at te popular MP games like battlefront 2, Destiny, and CoD. They’ve been nothing but controversy and been a exposing these companie’s greed. Is this what he calls “the bastion of gaming?” Greed, lott boxes, and systems to give players disadvantages to prey on idiots?

Like you said, make a good game and it will sell. This “AAAs are too expensive” is nothing but Bs to push GaaS and Mp games... and I am not sure if Remedy is one to talk after wasting so much money hiring actors to make a TV show in a game when games like W3 and Horizon probably cost less to make

[Michiel1989]

@genji
You act like all mp games are like cod and bf2 (can hardly call Desinty a multiplayer game.more a co-op game) for gods sake u even have Genji in your name. Why don't u list Overwatch then?

there is actually truth in the statement that AAA games are too expensive, everything needs to be mocapped, voice acted, have several CG cinematics (those cost a fucking fortune to make) bug testing (cause otherwise people get pissed and send death threats to developrs etc). Why do you think hardly anyone makes AAA games for a niche audience or tries new style of games AAA? Only one I can think of is sony with Media Molecule and Quantic dream, but they got the audience to make it worthwhile. Not all developers have that luxury.
So what is the upside from a developers perspective to create a new AAA game that might or might not be succesful. Besides having more creative freedom not much, they are just gambling with their jobs then. They are developers not slot machine players.
I wish this weren't the case, but sadly it is.

Try and see it from a developers perspective and before you say yeah its only the publishers that just want to make as much cash as they can (of course there is some truth in that). If the developers try something new and it doesn't meet the expected sales, what do you think happens? They get shut down and then it's actual people losing their jobs and livelyhood.
You seem to forget that the actual developers have lives and families they need to provide for as well.

[sigrid]

@Michiel1989

Every game you listed is multiplayer. And your wrong if you think people don't care about bugs in multiplayer games. I think the mistake your making here is thinking that just because a game is multiplayer that it will be successful. Why did Battleborn fail or Lawbreakers or Titanfall 2?

[AspiringProGenji]

I said the popular MP games have been controversial by showing those companie’s greed. I didn’t mentiom Overwatch becaus it hasn’t been as controversial as these.

Overwatch is a great game and more than that it is a blizzard’s game, who happen to have a massive community. However, not every Mp game has had the same success. So they aren’t really “the bastion of gaming.”

[Lennoxb63]

Nobody said that every MP game is successful. But they do have a higher success rate. For every one super successful SP game, there's two to three successful MP games.

[DJStotty]

Wolfenstein - the new colossus, no multiplayer, great game, no excuses developers if its costing too much for YOU to make a AAA game, then you need to cut some costs.

Neverwinter - F2P, all DLC content free, great game, developers dont complain about production costs.

Sick of hearing this whiney BS to try and justify when they put MT's in games you have already paid for.

[kneon]

Also, multi-player games have much higher ongoing costs. Those costs have to be paid for by someone, and that someone is you.

[UCForce]

Are you seriously want to get rid of Single Player games ? Is that you want ? Even Gaas is the future of gaming, but I can tell you that Gaas will never be perfect future.

‘Bastion of gaming'? More like 'almighty dollar worshipping corporates and publishers fleecing consumers for yearly fads'.

[plmkoh]

LMAO nice stealth trolling.

Let me guess, is it because Microsoft decided to focus on multiplayer games and the competitors decided on offline experiences?

[Silly gameAr]

What world do you live in?

[KingKionic]

Look at any streaming platform.

What games are the most played?

There`s nothing to debate.

[Rachel_Alucard]

@Kionic

You're reading statistics like every viewer = a player and every streamer = everyone. Where did you go to school?

[rainslacker]

If you add up all the sp and mp games out there, and who is playing them, sp games do still win out on an overall basis just due to sheer number of releases. It's easy to prove a point when you look at individual instances of one or two games compared to another, but it falls flat when looked at in a broader scope.

The thing that publishers see though is that a no game generally costs less to make, and tends to pull in more revenue when successful. But a mp game is just as prone to failing as a sp game is, and the more mp that comes to the market, the harder it is for it to find it's place. The sp and mp market both have this issue though.

What I see more from some people like Kionic is they seem to imply that sp just doesn't have a place anymore, because the mp market dwarfs the sp market enough that sp games are no longer viable. This is far from the truth, as both markets have plenty of room to sell software, and both markets have plenty of potential growth. The way to get that growth isn't for devs or pubs to keep throwing things against the wall to see what sticks, but focus in on making a quality product that serves it's market well.

[Rachel_Alucard]

Yeah in the west. The west is too focused on demographics, monetization, and broad appeal to sell as many units as possible even if the game is shit. All the top western games are multiplayer only or focused on while in the east you have well developed single player games topping the charts. It's pretty pathetic when people say the west is better.

[KingKionic]

In the west?

Look at China. All the major games purchased from consumers are online games.

Even PUBG is DOMINATED by China.

[Rachel_Alucard]

@kionic

Its dominated by China for all the wrong reasons. China populates any game they can make a profit off of instead of actually playing it. Plus your deriving info from steam only and you have no actual data to back anything up. How do I look at China when nothing is posted outside of steam?

[FreddyFazbear]

Stop with your Opinion as fact Bullcrap. Bastion of gaming my ass. Zelda won GOTY last year, and even horizon persona 5 and mario was nominated. Just because MP has so many players does not make it the best. If thats the case then pokemon go and day Z and all those crap MP games are good. Well I guess your more of an expert than nintendo and sony when it comes to games and they should stop making SP games like GOW, spiderman, mario, metroid zelda etc. Like i told xbone fans. You guys can talk all you want but SP games will always stay and they are the ones who built the gaming industry since the magnavox odyssey and atari 2600 until now. There were space invaders, pitfall, pacman, mario, zelda and so forth. And none were MP only games. Say whatever you want, but your petty and patheric attempt will not stop sony nor nintendo from releasing quality SP games. Your Comment lowered my IQ to -100. You won best idiotic comment of the year. bravo

[UCForce]

Can you say same thing to Lawbreakers and Evole ? Two games were MP focus only but they didn’t successfully.

[BeOpenMinded]

Lot of downvotes here and I'll get em too but online gaming is the next step in gaming and hours spent heavily back that up

[codelyoko]

Remedy is right. AAA is hard to sustain nowadays

[Mr-Dude]

I don't agree. I didn't ask for expensive celebs in my games, they earn enough in movies or elsewhere. I didn't ask for photorealistic graphics when they can't even get games to run 1080 60 fps on the standard consoles. Devs need to get there priorities straight. Like mentioned above, there are enough SP games which were cheaper and did great.

Whenever I hear a dev or publisher say this I roll my eyes...

[Brian7655492]

I agree, too much is spent of marketing and all flash with no substance. Quantum Break wasn't very good and why pay actorts and spend so much on live footage? Alan wake also suffered from substance. I did like Max Payne.

I get tired of the excuses, the only thing I will say that might be tougher for them is the widespread of the used market. It's so easy now to sell/trade your games that I can imagine they lose quite a bit of sales from it. In the end though there have been many success stories from Horizon and Witcher III all the way down to Stardew Valley. Why can Nintendo and Sony be supportive and succeed in this area?

[PsBoxGamer]

Lml I don't give a damn about expensive Celebes.I'm good with a talented college intern lol

[LandoCalrissiano]

Oh sorry, I didn't realize the world revolved around what you ask for...

[Petebloodyonion]

"I don't agree. I didn't ask for expensive celebs in my games, they earn enough in movies or elsewhere. I didn't ask for photorealistic graphics when they can't even get games to run 1080 60 fps on the standard consoles"

1) REMEDY didn't ask for celeb and video, MS did and paid Remedy for it
2) Funny, one of the prime reasons for cost going up are resolution and texture, the thing you actually complained about
3) Care to name some cheap AAA single players that did great?

[Mr-Dude]

@bloodyonion

If you read above.....

Hellblade, Witcher 3 , HZD etc

Ow, and I didn't ask for 4K graphics, don't care for it too. First dev should focus on 1080p 60 fps standard.

[Lamboomington]

Don't you get what 'AAA' means ? If your game is AAA you have to compete with other AAA games. Graphics is a HUGE part of that, everyone knows that. There's a reason Sony first party devs spend so much time pushing that so much. Production value is not a low priority.

[Petebloodyonion]

@ Mr-Dude
OK, YOU are requesting 1080P and 60 frames and why? why not 720P and 30 frames like Pc laptop resolution?
And by judging by the interest of the PS4 Pro and Xbox1 X it seems that some other ppl do want 4K wich = in the end, higher cost.

As for your gaming list, Well Horizon Zero Dawn cost the average 50 million (47) 5 times the cost of Gears of War1,
Witcher 3 cost 80 million so 8 times the cost of Gears of war1 and Hellblade an Indy game cost 10 million

So again, what's wrong with remedy's comment about development cost going up fast compared to the last generation?

[G3ng4r]

You didn't ask for this, maybe, but that's where AAA has been going for years. By the time ps5/xbox2 come out games could start at $80. You think sony or microsoft are going to sacrifice anything in their spec wars peen competition? Nop.

[rainslacker]

Apparently it is for the games which don't sell well. Is that a problem with the budgets or the production/marketing.

Last year there were quite a few notable sp games which were successful and you didn't see any complaining about them being unsustainable. You only see this type of comment from those who don't have successful products.

But the reality is is that whether a game is so or mp, it still had a chance to flop hard. I'd even say that a mp game that flops hard early likely will never make money, whereas a sp game still has potential to keep bringing in revenue over the long term.

[Italiano1234567]

maybe they're just making excuses because their game sucked and didn't sell well

[Cyborgg]

smh lol

[Silly gameAr]

Remedy is actually an awesome dev. I want to see what they could pull off if they had a big budget.

[RememberThe357]

Remedy is awesome, Quantum Break was boring, flat, and uninspired. The TV show that came with it was horrible and you needed to watch it to know what was going on in the game.

It might have been a good idea but the end product was weak and as people have implied, if they can go back to making games instead of TV shows I'd be excited to see what they can do.

[GrubsterBeater]

@Silly gameAr

"I want to see what they could pull off if they had a big budget."

Well, you're in luck! You can actually check it out right now if you want. They did make a game with a huge budget... it was called 'Quantum Break'... and it was terrible..

[starchild]

I liked Quantum Break. I played it on PC and I'm glad I didn't skip it. It was right up there next to Alan Wake for me. Plenty of reviewers liked it too. So please quit acting like your opinion is a fact.

[Cyborgg]

I have to disagree with you. It was not up there with Alan Wake imo.

[Nyxus]

"The expectation level from gamers is really high in terms of how long the game is, what sort of features it has, how good the production values are."

Yeah, this is the problem, I don't think every game needs to huge, there can be different variations. Look at what Ninja Theory did with Hellblade, it's a relatively short, linear experience (released at a lower price), which didn't need to sell millions to be able to recoup the costs. Not every game needs to be a huge open world sand box that takes 40 hours to beat.

[Lennoxb63]

Some studios are usually working on many smaller projects to fund one big project.

[Razzer]

Plenty of studios do just fine making single player games. Difference is they make better games than Remedy.

[Str8Chaos74]

100% This!

[starchild]

Not really. I really enjoyed Alan Wake and Quantum Break. I liked them better than quite a few other games that sold better.

[Razzer]

Sure, but their games have limited appeal. Personally don’t care for QB at all. Alan Wake was good though.

[Hardiman]

Alan Wake was great,QB not so much!

[Yui_Suzumiya]

I haven't played Quantum Break but I'll defend Alan Wake and Max Payne because they were awesome!

[jrshankill]

Lets not forget Quantum Break featured the TV show between levels. I'm sure that stacked up the budget pretty quickly.

[DFresh]

I think we’re at the point where the graphics have improved enough. Now I want to see better performance and optimization for games.

[UltimateRacer]

Had Quantum Break been a good game then you would of sold enough copies to make the money back plus perhaps a little profit to.

[jrshankill]

I didn't finish it, but I will go back to it now on One X.

[Pancit_Canton]

That's part of the risk on developing a single player game. Just make sure that your game is great and you have a great publisher to market and sell your games for you. Single player games could either be rewarding to both developers and gamers or it could go south.

[Ghost_0f_Tsushima]

“Remedy: The Traditional AAA Single Player Experience Is Really Expensive To Make, Costs Went Up 10x”

Then game prices will rise to the point consumers can’t afford and single player games will come to an end. Sounds like a great future.

[Mr-Dude]

Then the whole gamemarket will crash. A lot of gamers including myself will stop buying that crap or go find another hobby, so less money.. Hence another crash. Not that big like in the '80, but still big enough.

[Ghost_0f_Tsushima]

Maybe the gaming market needs to crash with loot boxes and micro-transactions taking over gaming and lack of focus on single player games.

[showtimefolks]

yeah costs go up when your games take twice the development time of a normal development studio and you are doing a TV show to spend your time and resources. Anytime a new console comes out we hear how easy it is compared to past consoles to develop for

development went up when a game costs $40 million to develop and has a $60 million dollar advertisement. GTA5 costed over 100 million yet total cost was $256 million now think about that. R* spent over 140 million on advertisement alone and that was for an already established IP

normal cost of development now a days is between 45-60 million

manage your budget better

since max payne your studio is known to take the longest yet deliver only good games

[PhoenixUp]

We’ve still had plenty of successful single player only games in recent times

[Razzer]

And some multiplayer-centric busts. Some act like multiplayer is a silver bullet. Sorry....it is not.

[Str8Chaos74]

Yep, ask the people who made LawBreakers.

[WelkinCole]

Tech is improving and cost are coming down for them as well. I have seen some new companies are starting to use smartphones for mocaps because tech has advance that fast. 3d scanning software have matured.

In the end. Make great games and they will sell and make a lot fo money. You only need to look at Sony, Nintendo and studios like Red to see the evidence of that.

[neoandrew]

Horizon zero down cost was about 45 mln EUR to make, yet it was a success.
Just make good game, thats all.

[DaigotheKing]

It definitely costs a lot when Remedy splurges on hollywood actors likeness and voice acting and try and make a tv show within a game.
Like seriously the game was bogged down with a bunch of unnecessary spending that ultimately added nothing to the game. Quantum Break is hardly a good example of proper triple A gaming development. Just saying. I mean hellblade was made for waaaaaaaay less and it's a pretty good game all around.

[Skankinruby]

Sounds like a weak ass excuse for the underwhelming game they put out. But if this is true and games go predominantly multiplayer then I'm done with gaming altogether

[gangsta_red]

I definitely see their point from the article. I'm this day and age everyone is expecting better graphics when these games are revealed. It must be a tremendous pressure on devs to try and match gamer expectations when it comes to graphics.

It shouldn't be an issue but when you have reviews or fan comments for games that will excuse one game for looking poor because it may be from a company that's not known for HD high level graphics but then burn another that at least tried then I can see why these devs crash and burn with triple A development.

I see people saying roughly "just make a great game". But if that riddle was cracked then we wouldn't have any issues at all, making a great game is tough because that great game isn't great for everyone.

And it must suck to spend 4 or 5 years making a game and then for people to complete it in 6 or 7 hours and then put it away for ever. Such is life...

[starchild]

Exactly. It's not as simple as "just make a great game". If it were that easy every game that released would be deemed a perfect 10. But there's no special formula for a "great game". It's highly subjective. And it's hard to predict how a game will be received. Plus, there are things such as bias and bandwagoning that do affect how a game is perceived as well. Don't try to tell me it doesn't happen because I've seen it many times in my 30+ years as a gamer.

[FPS_D3TH]

No... adding a tv show with somewhat known actors is why your single player game cost so much.

[LandoCalrissiano]

Yeah like Normand Reedus is cheap...

[Soc5]

The reality is that AAA single player games have always been a risky investment and companies no longer want that risk, and would rather have an easier go of it ala multiplayer or appstore 99 cent games that make a ton vs company investment. I think a good single player game can still make a lot of money but the margins are higher on the other game types available. But I hope single player doesn't go away. There is always room for Red Dead, Witcher, Uncharted franchises, A good story never gets old.

[RememberThe357]

I think it's more about the bigger gaming companies and their investors. A lot of these investors have nothing to do with gaming and are just in it to get a slice of the pie. It's like movie producers verse some oil Baron funding a film. Odds are the movie producers are more willing to take chances with their film because of their knowledge of the industry and the creative process. The oil Baron on the other hand will want whatever it takes to get a profitable return. None of this dictates the quality of the film, but it damn sure has an influences the likelihood of quality.

[kevnb]

multiplayer games are even riskier, if a multiplayer game doesnt have instant success its doomed.

[TheOttomatic91]

If you think adding MP and/or co-op is going to automatically solve things whoo boy are you in for a rude awakening

[GamesMaster1982]

Maybe if they did not waste half the money on the live action crap in Quantum Break then it would of been cheaper. And just hire Voice actors instead of paying shit loads to movie actors would also of kept the cost's down. Hell if Kojima had hired anyone except Kiefer Sutherland in MGSV maybe we would of had a complete Fing game there also. So no some dev's actually know what they are doing and make an excellent single player story game well in budget.

[Eldyraen]

I enjoyed QB but let’s be honest, a big part of that inflation was probably because the game included around 2-3h of live action bits that we could have lived without. I guess it’s a natural enough idea after MP’s graphic novel approach and then Alan Wake’s much smaller live action bits on tv but it definitely had to sink quite a lot of cash and time on top of traditional mocap and development for the actual “game”.

[Godmars290]

More than likely the live action segments blew up costs.

[KaaF]

What? Making both a game and a TV series with famous actors is expensive? Noooooo.

[Godmars290]

But was it a TV "series" or in-game segments? Did things change from one to the other after the always online plans fell-through?

[justsomeoffdude]

Another "games are expensive to make" excuse..
Hello, ninja theory says hi

[EddieT]

And of course, not focusing so much on graphics, pre-rendered cut scenes and bombastic set-pieces in an effort to lower costs is completely out of the question. Oh wait...

[OpenGL]

No one forced Remedy to have 3 hours of live action TV with actors from programs like Game of Thrones and The Wire. I don't buy this argument when stuff like Hellblade exists. Focus more on making compelling gameplay experiences like Japanese developers do and it'll be easier to turn a profit.

[starchild]

Japanese developers do make some great games, but so do plenty of western developers. I personally find most JRPGs terribly boring. Aside from action RPGs like Nioh and the Souls games what are all these amazing Japanese made games? I just don't understand why Japanese devs would be put on a pedestal like that.

[OpenGL]

Yakuza, Breath of the Wild, Gravity Rush, Nier Automata. All of those games aside from maybe Breath of the Wild likely cost a lot less to make than Quantum Break. All of them are better than Quantum Break and I say this as someone that owns both versions of Quantum Break.

[MasterCornholio]

Plenty of developers make single player games that are successful. What developers need to do is manage the budget of a game well and make sure that it sells enough to make a profit. Developers like Guerilla Games and Nintendo make it happen so I don't see why Remedy can't do the same. It's not like Remedy are not capable of making good games. The issue is that they made some pretty big mistakes with Quantum Break and that ended up hurting them in the end.

[Cobra951]

Big mistakes indeed. They paid to make both a TV show and a game, and then sold it just as a game. The result was uneven and simply didn't take off. It was a bad decision, and it cost them dearly. They should learn from this, and move on to make better games within reasonable budgets, not throw in the towel on SP games.

[bluefox755]

Yeah, games are expensive to make, so it helps if you make a good one, so people actually buy it.

[cfc83]

Did costs go up 10 fold for everyone ? Not so sure anyone else had a tv show with Shaun Ashton on their expenses list.

[MrSwankSinatra]

Yeah right. First off adding Co-Op would've made Quantum Break and Alan Wake more expensive so them trying to insinuate that it would have been cheaper is just nonsense. Plus the reason why their costs went up is due to Quantum Break being a cross entertainment game with TV, regardless if the TV episodes sucked, merely creating a pilot episode is freaking expensive let alone a series of them, on top of hiring celebrity actors. Remedy have only themselves to blame for the costs, next time hire someone that can micromanage their finances.

[TheVigilanteCode]

If they went back to making classic remedy games like Max Payne which focuses on gameplay more than cutscenes (let alone paying hollywood actors in millions of $$$) they can cut back costs of making their games significantly down.

[Redemption-64]

I wonder how both Sony and Nintendo are able to keep pumping out good quality single play games and still seem to be making a profit

[MasterCornholio]

By managing their budgets and sales expectations I guess.

[LandoCalrissiano]

Well for starters they are both massive companies that publish their own games and remedy is not... Can hardly compare the two.

[MasterCornholio]

Remedy had a massive company fully backing their game so it definitely wasn't an issue with funds. Remedy just made some pretty poor decisions with the game and some of those decisions were made by their publisher (Microsoft).

[Pantz]

Make a good modern SIMANT game on the cheap and I'll buy the CE for $120.

[Phoenix76]

Whilst the cost of development has gone up slightly, what really costs the most is the marketing campaign that bigger publishers push. Some publishers will pump over 100mil on marketing drives alone! That where the true cost is.
A quick example would be call of duty modern warfare 2. 50 million to make, 200 million to market

[chris235]

honestly, as a customer, i don’t care. lose the expensive and dull mocap cutscenes, lose the voice actors and multiplayer and start making good old games again that are engaging.

[neocores8055]

well if ur AAA game was good.. The cost would not matter...

[Blu3_Berry]

That's why it is important to find some kind of middle ground. Look at Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice. That is a $30 indie title with AAA quality with a budget and it has already turned profit for them faster than they expected it. It also helps that they weren't having a corporate breath down their neck so they had alot more freedom and creative control. They did a phenomenal job on it, and I think publishers and developers should take more inspiration from that.
Not saying every corporation does this, but some publishers are guilty breathing down their necks such as EA and Activision.

[gamer7804]

why not build a single player game where you can download additional story content, people will pay for that.

[Youngindy21]

Perhaps they need to cut their development time in half and get rid of unnecessary things in their games like collectibles, readable content(that nobody reads), live action scenes with expensive actors, etc. Also they should focus on making their game FUN and ADDICTIVE and that will make it replayable.

[PUBG]

I really don't get how costs keep supposedly going up, it doesn't make sense.

A. Anyone can download Unreal Engine 4, Cryengine, Source and Unity for free in todays age, paying royalties only after you hit a certain sales threshold.

B. Game engines are easier to use than they ever have been in the past. Game developers always come out on promo videos when a new engine launches, talking about how a task that used to take a team of 10 people, 10 years ago, now only takes one person to complete with todays technology.

C. Game distribution is easier and much more cheaper than it has ever been. You can launch unfinished games on Steam Early Access and the Xbox Early Access program (PUBG), and at least in the case of Steam, it only costs $100.00 to do so. There is no longer a need to have a costly packaged product on a store shelf, since releasing a game digitally on Steam, Xbox One, Google Play Store, Apple App Store or PS4 exposes your game to 150+ million gamers(minimum) around the world.

D. Advertising has never been easier and cheaper, with Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, Reddit, and the myriad of gaming news sites that help to get the word out.

I've done some game testing at EA Vancouver, and what they have isn't simply a studio, it's literally a full-on campus, probably worth tens of millions of dollars, and possibly even hundreds of millions of dollars, I don't know exactly, but it's very high-end and it's huge. Other developers, like Remedy, also have really fancy expensive studio spaces, usually in swanky areas of major cities around the world, where the leases are ridiculously sky-high.

There's no doubt, that their taste for expensive high-end studio spaces, helps to jack up their costs significantly. These people are also not driving little Renault cars or 1990s Chevy Cavaliers, they're driving BMWs and Audis. Perhaps they should consider toning down the luxury work environments, with cafeterias and expensive cars, and bring down their needs to real world levels, then we wouldn't need to hear the complaints about this nonsense.

And if they want to complain about their work environments and long hours, then perhaps they should stop by some construction sites or some manufacturing facilities, and see how good they actually have it compared to the average consumer that buys their games.

This is just my opinion.

[rainslacker]

While I don't disagree with you on how it's hard to fathom why it costs more, I thought I'd point out a few things.

A. Any AAA game is going to pay the base royalty fee. That's around $500K. Paying the threshhold royalty fee is good for smaller developers who can't afford the upfront cost, and aren't likely to rake in hundreds of millions of dollars. If they go that route though, they end up paying half of all revenues(not profits).

B. Pretty much true.

C. While distribution channels are much more varied and accessible, a big AAA game is likely to have a standard physical distribution as well, so no saved costs there, but that's not really part of the development cost. Steam, PSN, XBL, etc all take about 20% of the sale price, so there isn't any real savings in terms of profit compared to what it cost to distribute physcially. Maybe $3-5 per copy.

D. Pretty much true. It doesn't stop a lot of AAA games from having marketing budgets which are equal to, or more than the actual development cost though. It's not really necessary to have those things though, so if they do, then that's more a poor expenditure. When it comes to the costly kind of marketing(mostly TV commercials), those are usually only effective if you go big, which is quite costly.

EA Vancouver's campus is more than just a single studio. They also work on other aspects of the company as a whole, so it's not all wasted. However, you are right, there are quite a few developers who have rather fancy offices. Not all of them of course. On the flip side, you have a company like Epic games which has a rather modest building, although it's pretty state of the art in a very expensive area to have property in. However, it's worth pointing out that a lot of these developers do get rather extensive tax breaks to set up shop, as it's not dirty industry, which helps add to the value of the area as a whole, and helps bring in more tech companies, which is a good thing for the community.

As far as complaints about hours.....while I empathize, because I've been there myself(worked for an EA studio myself during my internship), it's been like that for so long that it shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. I know there are always those within any company that complain about it, but I think that's just human nature. It sucks, and it's worse at companies with poor project management, but I've never heard of a single game that didn't have the crunch time. It'd be nice if there were more consistency or ways to avoid it, but even companies that work hard to avoid it, still face it.

[PUBG]

Great response, thank you!

[AmstradAmiga]

People on this site act as though AAA games are being made for the same or less than AAA games from 10 years ago. Its simply not the case!

[rainslacker]

It cost about the same to make a AAA game today as it did 10 years ago. In fact, a lot of times, it's actually cheaper to make AAA games because better techniques have been made over the years to make it happen. On top of that, media production for things like cutscenes or music, are actually cheaper to produce now than they were a decade ago, as demand has caused more competition, which has caused more companies that provide those services.

There are always games which cost more, some which cost less, but the average has remained relatively constant over the years, despite average salaries going up.

[AmstradAmiga]

Your must be joking. Look at how many people are involved and think about how salaries have changed. Those two factors alone make game development even more expensive today.

[rainslacker]

Nope, I'm not kidding. The average game budget nowadays is still about the same as it was at the start of last gen.

There are games that go beyond the average, but plenty of examples of great games, with plenty of content and production quality that don't have huge budgets.

There are some things which have become more expensive, and other things which have gone down in costs. I cited a couple of things.

Average salaries for game developers hasn't gone up much as a whole. In fact, graphics artists are so easy to find nowadays that they're cheaper than they were than at the start of last gen. Engineers do make more, but on any given project, that doesn't amount to a significant portion of the budget.

On top of that, a lot of the expensive stuff from the start of last gen, like media production, is now outsourced more to places like Korea, where it is a lot cheaper than maintaining a staff.

As far as the number of people involved, that just depends on what the management feels is needed to achieve the end product. For instance, Guerrilla Games and CDPR are relatively small studios that made rather massive games with high production quality. OTOH, any given COD has a staff of around 100-200 people.....compared to Naughty Dog who have a staff of about 200 people, which has two teams making two concurrent games, as well as having staff that exists solely for the purpose of creating Sony's game engine and API's....and those are the cream of the crop of game developers who get paid well above average....yet the UC and TLOU didn't cost significantly more than any game made from last gen.

It's easy to fathom reasons why costs may go up, but there is also plenty of evidence to suggest that the cost don't have to be as high as some of these developers or publishers are claiming. For instance, the development budget of Horizon: Zero Dawn was $49 million dollars.

In any case, Remedy is claiming a 10X increase in dev costs. Considering last gen, AAA games averaged between 30-50 million to make, it means that he's claiming that a AAA game now cost 300-500 million to make. Even the most expensive games to make don't reach that, so his statement is hyperbolic without providing more concrete examples of costs. Even if he could though, there are enough other examples out there of games that didn't have bloated budgets.

[JBlaze226]

If they stop hiring expensive actors just to give credit to their game because they have this a-list actor on board then maybe it wont be expensive

[DarXyde]

....They hired Shawn Ashmore. He has a ****in' net worth of, what, $200+ million? Did they think he would work for a manicure and a bag of Skittles?

Konami didn't even spend that much on Kiefer Sutherland who has a net worth less than 1/3 of that.

I wonder how much money Shannon Loftis is paying Puha.

[masterfox]

yeah put live action and Hollywood actors into the game and that will not make it more expensive , morons!

[Last_Boss]

Make better narratives and gameplay. Last gen burned put the MP. Stop trying to tell wack stories with overdone visuals. It's like going to movies nowadays and asking red did you watch for 2 1/2 hours.

[Cobra951]

Costs went up 10 times? Why? It takes a half a century at least for that kind of inflation. What are you doing wrong? You don't need to hire 7-figure celebrities, you know. Marketing can be done more cheaply with this little thing called the internet. Whatever else has run away from you, fix it too. Don't blame us; and don't think we're going to let you off the hook if you drop quality single-player games.

[rainslacker]

If they want to add MP or co-op, I don't really care. That's for them to decide. They don't have to try and justify it by trying to say that game production is too expensive. Even if it were more expensive, SP games generally sell better than they did for his time frame.

But yeah, 10X increase in cost is nowhere near the norm. At the start of last gen, the average AAA game cost between 30-50 million to develop. Today, the average AAA game cost between 30-60 million to make. Even that the low end, if it went up 10X, we'd be talking about a 300 million dollar budget. Even GTA didn't have a budget that big. Even Destiny, with a 10 year budget of 500 million dollars is the budget for several games and a bunch of expansions.....granted, it's a MP game.

I think if this guy wants to make such hyperbolic games, he should provide much more concrete numbers to back up his case. I doubt Quantum Break even cost more than 50 million to make. It probably had a 20 million marketing budget. Alan Wake was probably a $10 million dollar budget....so even then, it's only a 5X increase, and they added in a bunch of rather expensive productions into the standard game design which probably jacked up the cost. The game itself with regular cut scenes probably wouldn't have cost more than $30 million to make.

[Hardiman]

Welp I'm just glad there are companies willing to still make them! Shout out to Sony and Nintendo!

EDIT: Also maybe don't spend a gargantuan amount on Hollywood actors and marketing or trying to do photo realistic graphics when the hardware was what it was!

Also make a good game! That's the first thing to do and it seemed you forgot everything you did to make Alan Wake such a good game!

Again so many do it and do it well and did it well just this last year!

[ShadowWolf712]

Remedy: spouts off absolute BS to help Publishers justify killing off SP games.

[Miss_Vixen]

This is why I'm a proud owner of Sony's platform. Their first person division and exclusives have always devliered great single player games from the inception of the first Playstation into the current generation with them continuing the likes of Uncharted, Horizon, God of War, Days Gone, The Last of Us, Infamous, Rachet and Clank, The Last Guardian, Death Stranding, Detriot. and such.

Nintendo gets an honorable mentioned too.

[Btf_1991]

Nier Automata didn't cost more than $20M and it was an amazing game

[slappy508]

Well Ninja Theora showed there are cheaper alternate techniques to use. A good start, don't use well known screen actors. Also a large chunk of the budget goes into marketing these days. Just use your own YouTube channel to promote your game to generate hype.

[DivineAssault]

Games arent cheap to make.. The more companies focus on multiplayer only stuff, the less games im buying.. I dont mind MP games but it doesnt need to be the center of the game..

[nommers]

The simple solution might be to just focus on reducing graphical needs in the development process.

I really feel like pre-rendered backgrounds should come back into the mold. The ones from the FF and RE games of old still look incredible to this day. They look very detailed and create specific moments within their environments and they don't look the least bit recycled. Object programming time along with balancing frame rates that add on to the cost of gaming development could easily be reduced with the method of pre rendered backgrounds.

[r3f1cul]

bullshit ... its just poor budgeting ... games are cheaper to make than ever... dont believe this pity party shit for a second ... discs are a penny a dozen, they have digital sales that cost them even less to maintain, they dont follow the same tax exemptions as most other companies, movies have hundred million dollar plus and only charge 10ish dollars to view the product and make literally BILLIONS in return ... they just want something to blame for not being able to make something that holds peoples interest anymore... also MP in these types of games will NEVER help hold peoples interest ... a sub par game is a sub par game period

[Saijahn]

Witcher 3
AC origins
Horizon
God of war

Etc...make a good game and it sells itself

[toddybad]

Make games of a sensible size and not ones where you have to play for 150 hours to complete them.

[Markusb33]

But ps2 looking online shooters with one map are easy to create and can milk money out of gamers like no tomorrow

[madpuppy]

Most quality games make plenty of money, the kind of profits that Hollywood and the music industry can only dream about, and here we go again listening to this manufactured whining (boohoo, Games are expensive to make.) Don't fall for it, These Publishers and Developers are, for the most part, filthy rich.

[saphiron]

So thats why they have no Money left to fix that broken One X patch. Flickering walls everywere. I really wan't to play it, but can't stand looking at that.

[zivtheawesome]

Horizon has only cost 40million to develop

[DVAcme]

Why is it that Microsoft, their 1st/2nd party studios and the AAA big publishers like EA and ActBlizz keep bitching about the high cost of single player games, yet you have people like Nintendo, Sony and Bethesda that keep churning them out by the bucketload and both receiving critical acclaim and making bank?

[rainslacker]

Square Enix has made quite a few SP games since last gen, and most have sold pretty well, and outside of maybe FFXV, they didn't appear to have bloated development budgets. At least I never heard them complain about it. They were disappointed in the Tomb Raider game, but it sold 5 million at the time, and their disappointment wasn't because of the profit, but because they just thought it would sell more.

A AAA SP game doesn't have to sell 5-10 million copies to return a profit. Even if it sells 2 million fairly quickly, it'll return about 78 million in net revenues, which would be about a 20-40 million profit for the typical AAA SP game.

[NickAwesome]

I think he is exaggerating, horizon zero dawn (also a single player only title) was way more ambitious than quantum break but nevertheless was a smashing success

[TheVetOfGaming]

It just sounds like they are subtly trying to push or propagate that multiplayer is what people really want. Microsoft know they make more money that way. Tell a big lie enough and people will accept it as truth.

[lellkay]

How about you make a game without spending out your ass on famous actors and a full live action show... I get it, they wanted to try something new and i commend them for it... but then they moan at us for games being to expensive ffs... haha

[Picnic]

I think that Remedy should make a multiplayer only game based on the Quantum Break engine. No need to take many years to make it.

[CrimsonWing69]

Are you kidding me?

[Zabatsu]

What I'm amazed about statrmentd like this, is that the only ones saying something like this are crap developers. It' bullshit statements like this, companies use to enforce their schemes. Cut out content from the product, sell it as DLC, present loot-boxes. Present lesser content for more money. Even if costs has increased, so has the SALES.

[TheRacingX]

The price of games has been in the 49. to 59 range for at least 20+ yrs now.... I'll pay $79 for a good AAA SP experience...dont DLC me or MT me , give me a 15-20 hr top notch game with maybe multiple endings for replayability and Ill give you 20 more dollars.....hell , people pay $100 for a 'Gold' edition thats just DLC that should be in the game anyway.....

[DefaultComment]

Excuses and more lame excuses, so is not that nobody likes single player experience like EA said. But it's because it way more expensive to make? How about you go honest and say it's not as profitable as making a multi-player game with micro transactions and loot boxes? Is it that hard to admit?

[Zer0Flinch]

I understand that there’s story and character development etc. that goes into a single player experience but as far as game design goes I don’t see how a multiplayer game is any less expensive to make and I definitely don’t see how a co-op experience somehow lowers that number at all. Granted I’m not in the industry but I would think if you had developed a mp game you would have all those resources for a sp side and vice versa. Also games might cost more but that is a natural progression and game prices haven’t no gone up much but the number of games sold has dramatically increased over the last decade along with the size of the audience. Remedy’s problem is making SP games that people actually want to play.

[thisismyaccount]

Costs went 10x ... F~## off ... just take a break, analyze what made MP1 and 2 great and then realize how bad QB and AW are in contrast to MP1 and 2.

Prolly some key members of the MP1/2 team must have left them, 2 masterpieces versus 2 not so much ... then he whines about games costing 10x nowdays ..he can´t be serious ... how about ya cut that useless fat of your game aka cutscenes with paid hollywood actors?! that did not serve much context iirc at all.

WE NEED NIPPON BACK ON THE THRONE!!!
WE NEED SEGA BACK!
GIMMIE FFS! ridge racer type 4 remaster/remake at 4K60 already... i dont wanna cut myself like those sick slayer fans.

[AizenSosuke]

Okay It's understandable but no crates, no MTs, no BS !

[InTheZoneAC]

Excuses

[FlameWater]

R* makes some of the most expensive games possible you don't hear them bitching about it

[LandoCalrissiano]

Also the most profitable with the online multi-player portion in gta 5..

[Ittoittosai]

Hahahahaha nice try but publicly avaliable info says otherwise. Not to mention this is a company that spent money on live action cut scenes, actors, tv shows and then put out your product on the least selling console then yeah I can see it I guess. But honestly no I cant it sounds like they are just looking to add MT and loot boxes.

[Moonman]

They are just LAZY, UNTALENTED and MONEY HUNGRY. That is all. Bye! lol

[Vizigoth04]

Yeah. I can understand a game being expensive to make. The motion capturing of AAA games can take more time and resources than copy and paste a bunch of joe shmoes to fling bullets at. But I believe corporate heads also have a say in this. Meaning you will make this game Multiplayer and online and Gaas so we came make more money off of our mediocre install base. I haven't heard Naughty Dog, Sony Santa Monica, Guerilla Games, or Sucker Punch complain about making a single player story driven game either. Or an author right a book and then complain that no one was reading it still after the first time through. Where would these developers be when they were creating "AAA" games during the time of Nintendo's Super Mario Bros? Where there is no internet for multiplayer, to DLC or patches to send. My fear is these studios are getting full if two things Millennials who really want to work as little as possible and corporate executives that want to milk an already terrible game for all it's worth. I'm not saying every millennials are bad though and some would take offense as some are actually hard working SOBs. But there is less and less of raising the bar these days. More milking transactions instead.

[yomfweeee]

Basically this means they are going to implement microtransactions.

[wannabe gamer]

Stop trying to make cinematics BS and just make games

[kwijgaming]

Well yeah. Shawn Ashmore and Littlefinger aren't gonna work for free.

[1nsomniac]

...Developer confused by huge increase in costs.... (developer chose to replace standard cutscenes with live action, full episode, recorded scenes including current, high profile actors...)

...*Little old me face palms at the ridiculousness of the irony*...

[secrettalkshowhost]

Remedy has always been what I call a "game shame studio;" games aren't "cool," they aren't accepted by... I guess elderly suburbanites or dismissive little kids who think they're already adults or something. So they are ashamed of games and desperately try to nudge them towards being film like (or TV like as that's arbitrarily become respectable now).

Studios like this are always doing this "single player is dead and we need to do multiplayer" song and dance because it's just the inevitable outcome of putting such a high priority on looking like a different medium instead of just trying to do well your medium. Crytek went this way, Quantic Dream will go this way sooner or later. Even Naughty Dog will eventually go this way.

In about 5 to 8 years there will be articles where someone at Naughty Dog says their games are too expensive and they have to make multiplayer only shit. They'll eventually start hiring too many Hollywood people and their budgets will spiral out of control. When all you do is copy/paste film premises (The Last of Us is just The Road with zombies, Uncharted is just a more generic Indiana Jones) and desperately try to look like a movie studio the only way to move forward is to keep escalating down that path.

[Ethereal]

I can see costs increasing to keep up with the current trends in gaming. Graphics tech, voice acting, massive amounts of content. Honestly though that isn't an excuse. You can make a good single player narrative-driven game on a reasonable budget with some compromises. Stop making open world games, we don't need 400 hours of content. Focus on strengths, specific goals and deliver quality and the gamers will come. Stop hiring the latest popular Game of Throne actor to try and relate with an audience. Hell grabbing someone from the office dev team has worked wonders. Hellblade is a prime example of a successful single player experience on a AA budget. It can be done. I agree we are at a crossroads in the industry right now with the big publishers struggling to to grow their profits and their solution is to borrow from the mobile platform with microtransactions. Games as a service needs to die and quick. With the rise of multiplayer games, we are generally spending more and more time with a single game instead of purchasing several shorter games throughout the year thus keeping consistent cash flow to devs. In the past, devs and publishers could pump out games much quicker as the demand for new games was there when gamers could get through a game in a couple of sittings. That's just not the case anymore. They are all fighting for our time now and that's not was this industry should be about. It should be about the stories and experiences these games bring. Look at the history of Rockstar game releases. Notice anything about when the third generation of consoles released with dedicated online services?
https://www.reddit.com/r/ro...

[theXtReMe1]

There are two reasons why AAA games are more and more expensive to make, art and advertising... its expensive because everytime they create a new game, they recreate the wheel... literally. The majority of money goes into artists, creating art assets. There is also mass confusion between departments at big developers, because they have so many people working on one game. Sometimes, games are made cross continent... meaning that different departments are split by tens of thousands of miles between them, with only a few people in the company acting as liasons between them. If you have just a few people focused on their specific task, its much easier to streamline the process. You are in one room and can make split second decisions together. Something that big developers cant do.

The resolution: You hire a team of artists who do nothing but model ultra high resolution real world objects with textures for a living. Then, in game artists just copy and paste what they need for eternity(or at least until 32k textures become outdated). Saving time, money and making games a hell of a lot easier and quicker to make. Most of a games budget is spent on art, advertising, voiceovers and motion capture. You can easily save money on art by implementing what I said. Advertising takes care of itself if the game you are making looks and plays good enough. Anymore, you just hand over beta copies to Youtubers and watch the excitement grow.

As many before me have said, many Indie developers have made games with 10 people or less, that meet or exceed AAA standards. Why? Because there isnt the lack of communication. They have one goal, in one room and make all of their decisions leading up to the games initial development. They generally pull from premade art asset libraries that are available for rent or purchase online. So, then, the main focus is making a great playing, fun game. All that corporate developers care about... your money. From beginning to end, its about making a game that will make the most amount of money, that will make the board and investors richer. Quality generally takes a back seat to ways they can make more money. Loot boxes, season passes, in-game purchases, any way they can make more money without raising game prices over that $60 mark(which seems to be the line in the sand between the industry and consumers over whats reasonable for a videogame). Yet, many consumers have no problem paying 10's and 100's of dollars on in-game purchases.

I dont want to hear developers like this complain about game budgets, when they do it to themselves. Did you ever see the credits at the end of a game? Thee are thousands of people who work on any one AAA game. So, how do you justify that when an Indie developer like Ninja Theory does a game like Hellblade with 20? Its all in streamlining production and keeping the team tight. All working to make a great game, not a dollar. Because if you make a great game, the money will come.

We have been hearing these excuses from big developers for years. Telling us every generation that development costs rise exponentially... When the truth is, they keep opening new studios and hiring more people, instead of good people. They rely more on body count than talent. Which ends up costing them exponentially more. Then, instead of making a great game that stands on its own merits... they make a mediocre game and spend a fortune on advertising it. A great game will sell itself, you have to sell anything that is lesser.

If small Indie developers werent proving big developers like this wrong, then maybe Id buy it... but when 10 people in a 200 square foot room make a game that rivals a 50 million dollar production for pennies on the dollar, where does the truth lie?

[pecorre]

Remedy blew tons of money trying to make a tv show with Quantum Break. Now, they want to invest money in making multiplayer content for SP games. No wonder why the cost of making their game went up!!

[Chexs1990]

Lol, f**k off remedy, you sound like you're already in damage control for your next game -_-

[cyphertech]

This is such crap. Quantum break literally had a full length tv episode for an hour in between gameplay starring real actors. Think that might have kicked the price up a bit?

[michellelynn0976]

Games are expensive, but look at Horizon, Zelda and Mario. I think it is safe to say they did well and made more money than Star Wars BF2.

[Phantom68]

Yet Sony makes them

[FernDiggidy]

Remedy....sincerely, stfu.

[kevnb]

you guys made a tv mini series...

[BeOpenMinded]

Cooperative games are the best. Wish all games had an option at least. Can still be SP focused

[HyperMouse]

I call poppycock on this

[Pintheshadows]

You filmed a crap tv show with some half decent actors (and some dreadful ones) as well as making an average game. No wonder it was expensive. An expensive failed experiment.

[MWH]

No, greed went up 10x.

[Nintenzo]

Marketing far outweighs the development costs anyway but here -

Solution 1. Charge more for AAA games up front. Not downstream in micro transactions.

Solution 2. Make AA games every now and again

Solution 3. That blade of grass may not need 1,000,000 polys to make the game look AAA.

[Ryuujinjakka]

Says who? Remedy or Microsoft?

[Knushwood Butt]

I take it QB2 wasn't greenlighted then.

[Slowbro]

didn't remedy use live action for cut-scenes and then did re shoots with a new actor then even redoing parts of the game.

[spambot0815]

if it's not worth to be played alone, it's not worth to be played together.

[Nightcyberspud]

Maybe focus less on trying to make a tv show next time and just make a game.