Can developers and publishers actually afford the nextgen!

[Joelcool7]

Rol the question isn't will they the question is can they?

Which publishers can afford to develop software at double the Dev costs. Even if they raise retail prices it will be nearly impossible to turn a profit and breaking even will still be difficult. The economy is not strong and even though consumers would love those new games they will not buy them.

I just saw Silicon Knights interview in which it was predicted that soon their will only be five or six publishers on earth. These publishers will be the only ones capable of making a profit on new games. In dependant studios and all of the smaller publishers will die. I heard a year ago from a guy in the gaming press that shared that view. He said that in the near future Nintendo, Sony, Microsoft, EAGames, Activision and UbiSoft will be the only publishers he predicted that another publisher might survive in Japan but predicted Japanese publishers will either fold or merge in the future as Dev costs spiral out of control.

I have heard predictions that further in the future even fewer publishers will survive.

I don't know about you but I do not want that future. I might not have loved Midway or Acclaim but I still enjoyed playing some of their games. Atari wasn't my favorite publisher but when they had to close most of their internal studios I lost the opportunity to play some of their games.

The industry cannot afford to lose any more publishers or developers. People love the games that are on the chopping blocks they love the studios going under they love the publishers. We should not allow the industry to continue to collapse!