Heavy Rain cost €16.7 million to make and made Sony "more than €100 million"

[Slimebeast]

Some here have rightfully tried to expose this blatant lie and do their own calculations.

2.4 million copies at $30 gives $72 million in total revenue to the publisher (Sony). This assumes that all copies were sold at full price, but let's assume that for arguments sake.

Now how much did the game exactly cost including marketing? I have a hard time believing it really cost €40 million including marketing because that means over $50 million in total spend which just sounds unrealistic for a fairly "niche" game like Heavy Rain. Also, if it truly was $50 million that would only leave $22 million in profits to split between Sony and Quantic Dreams. So the €40 million (=$50 million) figure was just speculation from the Quantic guys' part.

Most likely this guy in the interview only had the €16.7 million dev cost (what his own studio spent) correct since he doesn't seem to have any clue about publisher economics. Anyway, €16,7 translates to around $22 million and if we add a more reasonable $15 million for marketing the total spend becomes $37 million. $37 million would need 1.2 million copies sold to break even, which also sounds like a reasonable original sales target for Heavy Rain.

So in conclusion, a reasonable estimation of total profit lands at $72 million minus $37 million = $35 million, which is very far from "more than €100 million" (=$130 million), but still very impressive.