Static, you're arguing these little points and missing the big picture. If a developer wants to make the same game they made for PS2 a few years ago for PS3 today, its a far, far, far riskier proposition. They've got 1/50th of the installed base. They've got less knowledge of teh hardware. Less middleware solutions and engines have been developed. The expensive hardware has sped up the graphical arms race. The audience is becoming more and more conditioned to expecting more and more content in each subsequent game, and expecting a MAJOR jump for "next-gen", especially if they're going to shell out so much money. When a developer comes out and talks about it being too expensive to develop for PS3 or 360 (and lots of devs are doing so), this is what they're talking about. Now, they might say "cost to develop in HD," which I guess the surface observation, and is only partially true. But costs ARE climbing. We can see the rising costs in game prices--both the console makers and game developers need the 20% more per game to keep having the same kind of profits. As for Gears only costing 10 million to make... Well, obviously there's a special situation with the engine there... As well as with the marketing, which was probably way above average... Still, no doubt a hugely profitable game, but a system's best-seller this far into its cycle better be.

Make the same game? Not possible for it to cost "more". Somewhere along the line they are going to want to push a boundary. New AI, Physics, tools, textures or techniques. And this all falls under choice I am well aware of the guidelines MS and Sony put forth on thier games so that also affects what you market a game as to a publisher. And you have inadvertantly made my point. There have been more middleware solutions that the next gen systems can take advantage of where thier previous entry's could not. And why is it do you think capcom and SE licensed the unreal engine? HappySqurriel, in postmortem roboblitz is an example of what I am talking about. Utilizing a next gen engine, team of 12 done in 11 months. "With that said, when people are talking about "Next Generation Games" they do not mean Capcom vs. SNK ..." And that is a problem. Who is defining what next generation is? Because geometry wars, zelda and MGS are all going to be next generation games. What I think is being referred to here is next generation AAA title. Yes it is going to be expensive if you want to make the next MGS, FFXIII or DMC. But if you were a small developer would you be trying to make such a game? Even if you were, how long would that take to complete? When you worked on a game, happy, who set the tone and the direction of the development? Who made the call of quality? Who set the deadline? Am I really that far off in saying that cost ultimately is choice. It has not been a result but a factor in the equasion. Let us try this. I would like people to make a list of developers complaining about how expensive it is to go next gen. Next I want you to see what they are trying to do while making this game. Anything new? Innovative? Making their own engine? Have they ever worked on the system before? Do they normally work on consoles? I don't want to sound like a nutcase but this sounds like the growing pains. I am sure devs balked at the cost of making a PS2 game or an Xbox game but as time progressed did the average game get more expensive or less expensive to make?

So an XBox Live Arcade game only cost about 1-2 Million to develop and (according to gamespot) only has about 4 hours of single player gameplay ... and there is no multiplayer ... Basically 1/5 of a single player campaign with no multiplayer is inexpensive, who would have thought that? Edit: I forgot to add the $500,000 to licence the unreal engine

Yup, And that is what I have seen most smaller devs do until they establish a name and can demand more support from a publisher. Look at what type of games n-space did before geist. (even though geist could be considered a failure it was really ambitious)

I think a big question will be how much the new middleware costs and how much it can help curb developer costs. Things like XNA, Unreal Engine, and other various middleware programs should help curb "some" things. You must remember, this is a large market. Costs will always increase to incredible amounts. Look at the movie industry, they spend $20m JUST on marketing. $100m to make a movie 10 years ago seemed to be crazy, but now most blockbusters start out at $100m and go upto $200m for a 3 hour movie! There's far more content in a game for 1/10th the price for a decent game. I believe that middleware will really help reduce the prices. Epic made GoW for $10m. Why? Unreal Engine. Most likely, it helped them curb their costs due to their devs knowing how to use it better than just building a brand new engine. Compare that $10m to the $12m it cost to make Red Steel...Just because a game is flashier shouldn't always mean a much higher dev price IF they can reliably use middleware, and documentation software to get more bang for their buck. If MS, Sony and Nintendo REALLY wanted to win the next-gen wars, they'd start putting together deals and packages with middleware production groups to allow devs to get a suite to build games without having to always build their own engines. Might restrict some content, but at the same time, it'd get costs down. I think MS is trying to do the right thing with XNA, and getting UE3 engine out there to devs to promote middleware...Same thing with using XNA to port 360 games to PC and vice versa, as it saves costs on multi-platforming games. Devs either have to make a game cheap or go multi. Therefore, it's in the big 3's intrests to use middleware, give devs better documentation software, and actually start putting the dev's intrests in mind. Its time they realize that the hardware means nothing if the devs can't use it. The hardware is just the pallete and colors of the artist, and companies like Sony are taking the items away due to outrageous archatectures.