By using this site, you agree to our Privacy Policy and our Terms of Use. Close

Forums - Sony Discussion - Shuhei Yoshida: Only Four Out of Ten PlayStation Games Make Money, but Sony Will Always Support Talent

DonFerrari on 07 July 2014
impertinence said:
DonFerrari said:

AA isn't unsustainable... throwing too much money at all games and wanting everyone to release just AAA is bad though... but in another thread about this we saw a lot of people complaining about Shuhei saying he doesn't understand the mentality of people wanting only AAA. And also people complaint about the "expect fewer games".

And Sony saying only 2 bring big money, another 2 break even and 6 is a miss (but if he don't disclose how much it lost we can't afirm it was a failed AAA, could be a smaller game that even costing little still didn't profit).

By 'AAA' I mean cutting edge technical games, if you want to use 'AAA' to mean 'top tier games' then sure, there will always be some games that are bigger and more expensive than others. What I call the 'AAA model' though is the current structure where developers and publishers chase technological benchmarks in a quest to produce the most technically advanced games they can and use that as a selling point. For a reference, see the retarded resolution wars currently going on for example.

The problem with this model is that costs are outpacing the gains in the customer base. The customers are already balking at increasing the price for the product and the growth in customer base is very slow (I would say it's even declining). Of course, cost of development will go down over time for the same assets, but if you want to be on the cutting edge, the cost will only continue to grow. This model is unsustainable and the lack of insight into this simple fact in the industry has already caused a lot of harm. 

I understand your point, but buying cost have reduced. Price tag have been the same 60 for like 20 years even tough inflation would double the price so in fact we are paying less.



duduspace11 "Well, since we are estimating costs, Pokemon Red/Blue did cost Nintendo about $50m to make back in 1996"

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=8808363

Mr Puggsly: "Hehe, I said good profit. You said big profit. Frankly, not losing money is what I meant by good. Don't get hung up on semantics"

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=9008994

Azzanation: "PS5 wouldn't sold out at launch without scalpers."

Around the Network
impertinence on 07 July 2014
DonFerrari said:
impertinence said:

By 'AAA' I mean cutting edge technical games, if you want to use 'AAA' to mean 'top tier games' then sure, there will always be some games that are bigger and more expensive than others. What I call the 'AAA model' though is the current structure where developers and publishers chase technological benchmarks in a quest to produce the most technically advanced games they can and use that as a selling point. For a reference, see the retarded resolution wars currently going on for example.

The problem with this model is that costs are outpacing the gains in the customer base. The customers are already balking at increasing the price for the product and the growth in customer base is very slow (I would say it's even declining). Of course, cost of development will go down over time for the same assets, but if you want to be on the cutting edge, the cost will only continue to grow. This model is unsustainable and the lack of insight into this simple fact in the industry has already caused a lot of harm. 

I understand your point, but buying cost have reduced. Price tag have been the same 60 for like 20 years even tough inflation would double the price so in fact we are paying less.

So you don't understand my point, or you do understand my point? When production cost goes up, but real price for the end product goes down (price at $60 for 20 years like you erronously claim) then the only way to sustain the model is to continue to grow the customer base, which is not happening. To capture more consumers games have to be brought to new platforms, but the price level on mobile is already set extremely low and no one will be able to sustain production budgets of $20 million and more and then sell the game for $5.

We already have companies complaining that games that sold 600 000 copies underperformed, that is a huge red flag to me.



DonFerrari on 07 July 2014
impertinence said:
DonFerrari said:
impertinence said:

By 'AAA' I mean cutting edge technical games, if you want to use 'AAA' to mean 'top tier games' then sure, there will always be some games that are bigger and more expensive than others. What I call the 'AAA model' though is the current structure where developers and publishers chase technological benchmarks in a quest to produce the most technically advanced games they can and use that as a selling point. For a reference, see the retarded resolution wars currently going on for example.

The problem with this model is that costs are outpacing the gains in the customer base. The customers are already balking at increasing the price for the product and the growth in customer base is very slow (I would say it's even declining). Of course, cost of development will go down over time for the same assets, but if you want to be on the cutting edge, the cost will only continue to grow. This model is unsustainable and the lack of insight into this simple fact in the industry has already caused a lot of harm. 

I understand your point, but buying cost have reduced. Price tag have been the same 60 for like 20 years even tough inflation would double the price so in fact we are paying less.

So you don't understand my point, or you do understand my point? When production cost goes up, but real price for the end product goes down (price at $60 for 20 years like you erronously claim) then the only way to sustain the model is to continue to grow the customer base, which is not happening. To capture more consumers games have to be brought to new platforms, but the price level on mobile is already set extremely low and no one will be able to sustain production budgets of $20 million and more and then sell the game for $5.

We already have companies complaining that games that sold 600 000 copies underperformed, that is a huge red flag to me.

And what AAA game is releasing on mobile for 5 bucks?



duduspace11 "Well, since we are estimating costs, Pokemon Red/Blue did cost Nintendo about $50m to make back in 1996"

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=8808363

Mr Puggsly: "Hehe, I said good profit. You said big profit. Frankly, not losing money is what I meant by good. Don't get hung up on semantics"

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=9008994

Azzanation: "PS5 wouldn't sold out at launch without scalpers."

crissindahouse on 07 July 2014

Well, they have to release games even if they are unprofitable because only that ensures that they can release enough exclusive games. If they would release only 40% of what they do, their first and maybe second party library would look pretty bad.

Problem is that it is probably the same for other developers and they don't have own hardware they have to push with this. They simply shut down studio after studio or fire employee after employee...



DonFerrari on 07 July 2014
crissindahouse said:

Well, they have to release games even if they are unprofitable because only that ensures that they can release enough exclusive games. If they would release only 40% of what they do, their first and maybe second party library would look pretty bad.

Problem is that it is probably the same for other developers and they don't have own hardware they have to push with this. They simply shut down studio after studio or fire employee after employee...


pretty much this.



duduspace11 "Well, since we are estimating costs, Pokemon Red/Blue did cost Nintendo about $50m to make back in 1996"

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=8808363

Mr Puggsly: "Hehe, I said good profit. You said big profit. Frankly, not losing money is what I meant by good. Don't get hung up on semantics"

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=9008994

Azzanation: "PS5 wouldn't sold out at launch without scalpers."

Around the Network
Raziel123 on 07 July 2014

I don't even know if I already posted in this topic or not but i'll just say that Sony is boss
And so is Yoshida

When TLG finally gets released, I hope there's an easter egg where you hold the hand of a Yorda character model whose face is replaced with Yoshida's face and you use your wooden stick to beat the crap out of shadowy figures donning Fumitu Ueda's face.



mtxamaze9142 on 07 July 2014

God of war acension made 10 million off 1million copies alone , vgchartz says it sold 1.86m and the game cost 50 million to make so they made a profit



impertinence on 07 July 2014
DonFerrari said:

And what AAA game is releasing on mobile for 5 bucks?

Yeah , if you're not even going to try to understand what people are saying, then I'm not going to bother with explaining anymore. I'm just going to chalk this one up to an unsurmountable language barrier and not imply anything that would prompt Conegamer to swing his ban hammer again.

- Moderated, Carl