Compared to the some of the big developers out there, Game Freak is relatively small. Companies like Ubisoft, Activision, and EA have massive amounts of staffers working on their projects. Meanwhile, the core team at Game Freak has only around 180-200 people working on Pokemon Sword/Shield, which may seem small in comparison.
Thomas Mahler: "Since it's quite bananas that a lot of players still do not understand the economy behind game development, I thought it'd be best to just break down a real example of a really successful first-time developer who managed to make a deal with a publisher. "
I wouldnt call a game that costs 10 million to make and had over 30 people from different companies working on it an indie game.
Seriously, no.
I don't get it..
He starts with 10M cost for the game excluding marketing and continues to detract "other"costs...
Why are the costs of storefront, engine etc not included in the 10M?
CEO makes CEO noises.
If he takes a 1 million dollar bonus every year the game is being made and the game took 5 years to be made, the "cost" isn't 10 million, it should be 5 million.
It's just more magical accounting. This industry is replete with it.
@Santouryuu
Yeah, it's weird. On top of that, he subtracts engine, tax from HIS own money, but this should be put on the publisher (or at least be split, 50%/50% or how they agree), because they're benefitting from the sales as well. On top of that, he makes it look like he didn't get a cent, but he (and his team) was paid the salary the whole way through, with bonuses and stuff. Probably rent for the office was taken care of as well and licenses/devices too.
And also, he acts like his games' average price was $10 (by the way, if the game cost $10 million, who decided to sell it for $20?! Sounds idiotic), which is ridiculous, popular indie games don't do 50% discount right after release and the most of the sales are done a few months after release (according to the publishers). As an example, look at Rimworld, Dwarf Fortress, Factorio, Kenshi, they either didn't have 50% discount yet or had it years after the release.
Also, he acts like the game was only sold on Steam, but that's false. And Microsoft, i'm more than sure, didn't take 30% from them (because it's a game published by them on their platform).
The only thing this tells me is that someone is trying to manipulate us and you shouldn't work with Microsoft if you want to remain sane.
Hi-Fi Rush developer Tango Gameworks has revealed a brand new logo/website, and that it is currently working on an unannounced action game.
IO Interactive is doing their own showcase this Friday and have revealed what is in store.
It may be interesting.
I am curious about their decision to do their own show.
You really comparing one developer to the biggest third party publishers of the industry? At 143 developers, Game Freak is a mid tier sized developer
They should have expanded over the years, the Pokemon games have always done well in sales thanks to the brand name alone so there’s no excuse to not expand your team so you can make each next project better than the last.
Recently it came out that 1000 people have worked on Sword and Shield, mostly from outsourcing it. Now for what the game looks like and the little jump it seems to have had for the next brand new generation of Pokemon with the first ever console game is ridiculous, they should have taken it more seriously.
I know it’s different for each studios and what specific game they make but CD Projekt Red has roughly 886 staff, NaughtyDog has about 336, The Collation is like 300ish, Platinum Games 224 etc. Point is look at what they accomplish and yet here’s GF who can’t even utilise 1000 properly
They have Nintendo’s backing so it’s not like they would be left in the shit.
Pokemon, pokemon = cash cow
If they want to start doing more than POKEMON then they're going to need to expand. Else they'll struggle juggling between it and their new IP if it takes off after release