| Esa-Petteri said: Hard data.. Average development cost for a game on a single platform is just bs. If one platform has quality game / shovelware much higher than another, average dev costs are lower! That does not make quality games any cheaper to make on that platform. |
There's plenty of data that says you're full of it, but I'll start out with this peice.
Here, we see that the same developer, who consistently puts out quality titles (Lair and Rebel Strike excluded) nonetheless sees their budgets going up, up, up with time. And the curve seems to be rather steep towards the end, no? Or, to repeat myself, what makes you think that "[a]verage development costs just magically skyrocketed when the HD systems came out. Developers suddenly decided that they would all spend a bunch of money to make me, the gamer, happy, their bottom line be damned"?
Oh, and the chart only tells half the story. The entire lecture at that convention revolved around how to live with the rising cost of making HD games. You should read it. It rather destroys this silly argument some here are making.
http://www.n-sider.com/contentview.php?contentid=2781[/quote]
Two points. First, you're wrong about those games not costing any more on HD systems. Allow the developers to speak for themselves.
http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=18247
"In terms of being very art-driven, it’s surprising to choose the Wii.
...And also budget comes into play. When you’re a new studio and you’re asking someone for four million, that’s a lot easier sell than asking them for twelve. It just comes down to numbers and risk assessment. So that’s the reason we chose that console.
Is that how much the game cost?
DB: I won’t tell you the cost of the games, I’m just giving you ballpark numbers. Wii development is easily one fourth, one fifth, even one sixth of some 360, PS3 projects, and those projects are easier to sell to developers, and they’re also a shorter timeframe to get the game out. I mean, our development on Mushroom Men is eighteen months."
Considering that the rest of the interview is devoted to talk about pushing the hardware, I'd say this interview rather cuts against your argument. Developers and publishers are all acting like Wii development is orders cheaper than HD development, with no reference to effort. They cite things like the need for bigger teams, more time, greater expertise, and the need for better programmers to make games for the HD twins. Against this, you bring only an unsupported hypothesis...
Second, and this is important, I want you to think about what the Red Steel thing means. It's the most expensive non-Nintendo game on the system. And it's still cheaper than the average HD game. That rather cuts against the grain of your argument, I think.
http://www.gamedaily.com/articles/features/cost-of-development-greatly-favors-wii-say-publishers/69714/?biz=1
Few quotes:
"This is clearly where Nintendo's Wii has an advantage, however. According to THQ Chief Executive Brian Farrell, while an investment in an Xbox 360 or PS3 game might be in the range of $12 million to $20 million on average, the money required for developing a title on the Wii can be as little as half that (or less), with an investment generally ranging from $5 million to $8 million. "It's that order of magnitude lower," Farrell explained to Reuters."
Then you can take a look what THQ has produced on wii:
http://vgchartz.com/games/index.php?&results=50&name=&console=Wii&keyword=&publisher=339&genre=&order=Sales&boxart=Both&showdeleted=®ion=All&alphasort=
on 360:
http://vgchartz.com/games/index.php?&results=50&name=&console=X360&keyword=&publisher=339&genre=&order=Sales&boxart=Both&showdeleted=®ion=All&alphasort=
on ps3:
http://vgchartz.com/games/index.php?&results=50&name=&console=PS3&keyword=&publisher=339&genre=&order=Sales&boxart=Both&showdeleted=®ion=All&alphasort=
Pay special attention on the amount of shovelware per platform. You might see why it is on average cheaper to develop on wii.
I'm confused. You've given me three lists of games, all three of which are composed primarily of the same shovelware. The only exceptions are WWE vs. Raw (which is on all three platforms), Saint's Row (good game) and de Blob (good game). The HD list is full of crap for adults, and the Wii list is full of crap primarily targeted at kids. But they're both still full of crap. And yet the HD crap is still much more expensive, on average, than the Wii crap. Or are you going to argue that THQ is a quality developer on the HD consoles?
It seems to me, again, that you're doing a great job of helping my side.
"When you talk about the PS3 and the Xbox 360, ramp-up costs are significant. You don't have the same ramp-up costs on the Wii because you have the tools already," Midway CEO David Zucker told Reuters. "
You can do the same for midway games, I'll just list midway's wii titles:
http://vgchartz.com/games/index.php?&results=50&name=&console=Wii&keyword=&publisher=225&genre=&order=Sales&boxart=Both&showdeleted=®ion=All&alphasort=[/quote]
You, er, may want to list Midway's HD titles too.
Look at how high in quality their HD stuff is! How could I not have seen this obvious truth before?!...
...
...
Yeah. Stop supporting my case for me. It takes the fun out of it.
And yet the price of Wii development is somehow still in stasis? Or are you trying to claim that HD development prices have dropped by a third in the past two years? And if third-parties have "the tools already," why are even the most anti-middleware companies turning to it this generation? Why is it that Square-Enix, who famously insisted on making individual engines for their games in order to get the most polish out of them, is now being forced to re-use the same engine for multiple titles and systems? And why haven't they done this in past generations?
Could it be that this is their response to the absurd HD costs? That they're clinging to these tools because that's the only way they can survive financially? And is it possible that despite have "the tools already," most companies are now bleeding money because of rising development costs?
The answer, my friend, is a sadly resounding "yes." I see what you're trying to say. And in fairness, that may play a role in the disparity. But you're deluded if you think that a lack of effort is primarily the reason why Wii games are several times cheaper to develop. When everyone keeps saying, again and again, that the HD games cost much more than the Wii and older systems because the HD twins demand more time and team members, most of us are willing to accept their explanation.
You're also deluded if you think that HD costs have somehow shrunk that dramatically in the past two years. I can't recall a single generation when development costs were halved over the course of six years, let alone were reduced to a third in just two. Again though, if you can bring forth some hard data that proves otherwise, I will concede.
I await your triumphant return.
