Study adds that about 60% of a game’s budget is spent reworking or redesigning a game

California based research company Electronic Entertainment Design and Research has claimed that only four per cent of titles that make it to market go on to make a profit.

Speaking to Forbes Geoffrey Zatkin, president of the 20-man sales data firm, divulged a number of interesting facts relating to a study recently completed for Ubisoft regarding possible upcoming title FutureNot.

He added that around 60 per cent of a game’s budget is spent reworking or redesigning a game, as well as stating that the average sales total for an Xbox 360 game is around 216,000 units – with the middle 50 per cent of published console titles selling between 75,000 and 250,000 units.

The average PS3 title, in contrast, sells a very specific 192,256 copies, meaning any title releasing on both Sony’s and Microsoft’s platform can expect to sell 408,336 units on average.

Implementing a co-op mode in a given title is likely to boost sales by 12,4000, whilst multiplayer features could see a sales hike of 25,000 copies. As this represents an addition revenue stream of around $1 million, EEDAR states that providing the total cost for these modes is no more than $300,000, it would be well worth doing.

Also highlighted is the fact that ongoing DLC releases help keep titles out of the second-hand areas of retail – and the fewer titles available second hand the better sales of new copies are likely to be.

First I thought this was sick joke,but when you think what kind a shi comes to each consoles now and then,its makes sence.

didn't read the OP, just the OT..and all I can say is...

Bullshit.

There is no possible way that only 4% of video games make a profit. It's not possible..the gaming industry would fail, we'd have no next gen consoles to look forward to - period.

^^

Also those numbers quoted seem like NA numbers only and not WW

And the difference between average PS3 sales and 360 sales is 24,000 units??

It seems hard to accept with the sales data we've received from vgchartz and NPD.

The 4% number was a misquote. Actual number is reported to be 20%.

http://www.edge-online.com/news/%E2%80%9C4%E2%80%9D-report-false-says-forbes-interviewee


“This was just a big mistake,” says a company spokesperson at EEDAR. “What Geoffrey said was that only 20 percent of games that start production will end up with a finished product. And of that percentage of finished games, 20 percent will make a profit.”

Nah the percentage makes sense once you consider just how many games are released and just how low the attach ratios are for each console. 360 has an attach ratio of 6 or something like that right? And it is considered to be the hardcore console with the fanbase that buys a lot of games. And once you consider that most of these sales will go to GTA IV, Halo, FFXIII and other blockbuster games then you will see just how little sales other games get. Why else do we have so many studios that release one game and are never heard from again.

I am going to use the 360 for my example:
It currently has 500 games if wikipedia is to be believed.
Lets say 360 has attach ratio of 7
Current userbase of 23 million. So about 161 million sales in terms of software
If I take the top 50 games then you get about 112 million sales. The rest is split between 450 other games, netting an average of 100k per game.

Even the crappy games still have to deal with publishing, licensing and developing costs and i doubt many games can survive on 100k or less. And this is 360 the hardcore console. Imagine if I look into the other consoles. PS2 had a much worse attach ratio and far more games, so the percentage makes sense to me.

4% big mistake? I bet. Told you it was BS in the other thread... and people even made theories on why it's correct.

20%? this one actually makes sense.

360 breakdown of sales (according to VGChartz)

Sold more then 500,000 - 100 games (20%)
Sold more then 400,000 - 119 games (24%)
Sold more then 300,000 - 156 games (31%)

Of course each game is different, and no one really knows the developers break even point.

Thanks for the link.

Still, 20% is pathetic. The industry is sick, and some of its members don't appear interested in getting any better. Their loss(es).