Modern Times - Budget Analysis ...

[theRepublic]

jammy2211 said:

theRepublic said:

NJ5 said:

Thanks celine. This part is almost scary to read considering the time it was written at:

The answer has to do with a concept called "market share". The basic strategy is to "buy market share". That is, you spend a lot of money to make a product that will sell very well. You still lose money on the product, but the huge sales you make put you in an excellent position to make money with a followup product.



The concept is sound and has been proven to work in many markets with different products. Unfortunately, there's an unintended side effect of such products in our industry: they raise the expectations of the consumers to levels that simply cannot be sustained. Once a customer has been dazzled by a money-losing yet fabulous product, he'll turn up his nose at a normal product delivered on a normal budget. And this is precisely what is happening to our customers. Nowadays, if you don't spend a half-million-plus on your product, it won't sell.

 

This is prety much what I have been saying about projects on the 360 and PS3.

 It's a trend that has been happening for 15 years+ and is elusive in gaming on all platforms.

As I said above Wii developement budgets (or at least marketing) is only going to get bigger and bigger, causing the smaller budget stuff to be ignored and thus the trend illustrated will continue. Just in a less tradional sense of the money being focused not on making a (subjectively?) better game, but on making the most marketable project with the widest mainstream appeal.

 

This is much less of a problem on the Wii.  There are plenty of smaller budget, innovative projects on the Wii.  I don't see many of those on the 360 or PS3.

As it currently stands, the technology in the 360 and PS3 has outpaced the business model of the industry.  The people who own these systems demand amazing, realistic graphics for every game.  That doesn't make sense.  Not every game can be a multi-million dollar production.  There needs to be middle and lower end games for every console.