| VGKing said: I'm glad you're using Crysis as an example, as that game is exactly why Crytek went multiplatform. Why? PIRACY. The game was pirated more times than it was bought. So to answer your question: it's not worth the investment. |
First game still sold 3.5m copies and was profitable after a year. The second game from recent comments didn't make a profit and they are counting on Crysis 3 which has a much shorter dev cycle (which means less dev costs) to make the franchise as a whole profitable again. They are also going back to PC melting graphics and the larger enviroments of the first game. Crysis 2 was the flop, and is the reason they are transitioning out of boxed AAA games into Free to play.
On topic there have been several trends which have meant that pushing graphical boundries has not really happened in the last few years. There is the long console generation of course and the developmental baggage that implies.
But more importantly pushing boundries requires new engines, and to really take advantage of modern systems you have to really change the engines and tool chains (how games are built) this all requires a lot longer these days. A new engine that offers all the features that are needed is not created overnight anymore. You hardly ever see whole new engines for one game anymore because they take so long to build and get the team up too speed on them. For example UE4 has been in development since 2008, and Tim Sweeny has been working on it by himself since 2003. And a game built on that tech takes another 2-3 years to make.
Then you have the rise of laptops for gaming etc and the F2P craze which requires millions of gamers being able to run the games and as they are usually multiplayer focused you can't realy have the graphics differ a whole lot without affecting balance.
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