Metal Gear Solid V cost over $80 million to develop, says Nikkei report

Hideo Kojima's latest & greatest was not cheap to make

[Chupa-Chupa]

That's less than the estimated amount of $100 million for MGS4.

[Yui_Suzumiya]

I believe MGS4 took longer to develop though

[Snookies12]

@GearsdoodooBruh - Kingdom Hearts 3 development only started fairly recently... You can't lump that in with games like Last Guardian and FF XV...

[bouzebbal]

@Snookies12:
KH3 has been revealed recently. no one knows how long time went into development.
MGSV was ready pretty fast after first reveal. It has been work in progress years before the reveal. Konami just don't reveal games in the early stages, but they tease instead.
We can't say the same about SquareEnix some years ago under the moron Wada. They switch developing platform all the time and games are started from scratch. Just look at Parasite Eve 3rd Birthday

[FallenAngel1984]

So that would mean not only is MGSV a smaller download size than MGS4, its also a cheaper game to make as well.

@ Solid Gear

No MGS4 took 4 years to develop from 2005-2008. MGSV took 5 years to develop from 2010-2015.

How meta

[just_looken]

If this includes the new engine aswell then thats cheap sense gta 5 was 256 million desteny yikes but that was 500 million and witcher 3 was only 70 million.

If you take all the innovation open world and rpg that the new metal gear has then what a bargain konami got. The games i mention all got there money back quickly metal gear solid pp should make this back by the first week.

Oh for those that dont understand all those games used new engines had open worlds and was long in development.

[fei-hung]

The $500mil for destiny wasn't just for one game but for the destiny franchise, including DLCs, marketing and extension packs.

http://www.engadget.com/201...

[spacedelete]

yet this is Konami's last big budget game. i think people are missing the real story here which reveals that Konami isn't interested in investing money in console games and forcing their best employees to do cleaning duties at their clubs. i advise everyone to boycott MGSV and hurt Konami where it hurts. this maybe your last chance to boycott as they are going full mobile after MGSV.

[IIFloodyII]

MGS4 cost less than 60 million dollars.

http://kotaku.com/5479974/k...

[Rookie_Monster]

nice find, in your article it also stated this:

"'Metal Gear Solid 4 producer Ken Imaizumi has stated that the claim that the PS3 exclusive cost $60 million is incorrect.

"It's being written in recent news that MGS4's budget was over 5 billion [yen] or 7 billion [yen]," Imaizumi tweeted. "It didn't cost that that much." If it cost that much, Imaizumi added, the game would've become multi-platform."

that explained why MGSV is also on all 4 consoles and PC instead of staying PS exclusives like MGS4.

[Batzi]

MGS4 did not cost $100M or $70$M. It was denied by Ken (Producer at KP).

[Chucky2003]

Where did you even get that,MGS 4 was between 30-50 mil to make,even that sum is too big,as for almost 100 mil$ for a videogame its stupid and reckles from Konami,its to damn much and they need to sell a lot of copies to make so
e profit,Witcher 3 cost I think 30 mil $ to make,and look how awsome that game is

[BallsEye]

Probably 50% of the costs is marketing. Game devs don't earn that much...unless you are really high in office food chain.

[PSIN4MANT]

Good lord.

[talocaca]

That's still a lot specially for a Japanese developer now that they have mostly moved to mobile.
I guess it's good or bad depending on how much they end up using the Fox Engine (as I imagine that took a bunch of money).

This might be the first Metal gear I don't buy at launch :/ not happy with the way Konami is treating Kojima Productions.

I'll probably just buy it second hand (but would never skip it!)

[SaveFerris]

Konami got mad at Kojima because that $80m could've gone towards a heck of a lot of pachinko games instead. /s

[theshredded]

that's awesome, shame it couldn't have been more. Konami must've fired Kojima because of his ambitious visions that require a lot of monet

[paul-p1988]

And Konami will make at least 3 times (conservative estimate) that in profit yet still claim game development isn't worth the investment...

[flyingwombat33]

Doubt that includes marketing. That's actually a little cheaper than I would have guessed.

[FallenAngel1984]

I really want to know what caused the dispute. Was this game's development cost do high that Konami couldn't tolerate keeping the developers around.

[our_games_are_art]

Other than PES I don't know of another game that uses the fox engine but just that and MGSV will mean konami will recuperate their investment and some. A shame I wish they could've let kojima make the grandest game possible. This is next gen now officially for me

[solidboss07]

Doesn't sound extreme at all for such a title. And does that include development of the Fox Game Engine?

[Jayszen]

The figure of $80 million is about right considering the open world and the multiple consoles it is available on. I would reckon this figure would have been much higher if this game were being made by Rockstar or Bethesda asJapanese devs tend not to have such large budgets by comparision. Kojima was the exception and no doubt this was one of the reason why Konami have behaved in such a shortsighted manner in parting with the master and winding down development for consoles.

Despite such a high price tag, the game will still make a profit given the following the series and Kojima have throughout the world, and the prestige that comes from being the studio / publisher that is associated with such a series cannot be underestimated. Konami is destroying itself in pursuit of boneheaded business strategies that are already tired and overdone.

[daBUSHwhaka]

Doesn't sound that bad really.I believe I read at the time that Modern Warfare 2 cost nearly 200 million.

[NoctisPendragon]

80$ million without the marketing seems like to much , it would be ok if other games did use that engine but it isn't the case .

[MilkMan]

80 mil?
This is what Konami was bitching over?
I thought this game was like 550 million or something?
80 mil?!?

Other triple A games I know have surpassed this amount and I also know made their money back. Whats Konamis problem?
I think the issue wasn't cost, but how to break ties with its caretaker.

In other words, its my ball, im taking it home now. Sorry Kojima.
I don't think it was ever about cost, or that Konami felt the game would be unprofitable.

Its about removing a man from the game that is basically synonymous with the property. Its more of a PR nightmare than an actual realistic one.

[JeffGUNZ]

Yeah, it can't be about the money.

It's a shame, I will get this game, but leaves me to wonder if they make another MGS game down the road, if it will ever come close to what we are getting now.