Well, they're working on it. MGS 4 will be selling more copies as a greatest hits game when the PS3's audience goes over 5 million in Japan probably by the end of March 2010 following the releases of GTA III and FFXIII as PS3 exclusives in Japan later this year.

And, Killzone 2 might not appeal so much to Japanese gamers for it to get a real boost in sales as the PS3's Japanese sales numbers continue to grow. However the strengthened support from Japanese devleopers for the PS3 which will be coming the PS3's way in the wake of the sales growth I mentioned previously that will cause definite distinction between the PS3 and 360 libraries later in this gen may lead more people to pick up Killzone 2 later in the gen.

Of course, I don't know how much it cost to make either MGS4 or KZ2. If it cost 60 million to make both MGS4 and KZ2. Then priced at $60.00 at launch, if they sold 1 million copies each they would be breaking even at one million sales, but to get the satisfactory profit I wrote about before, then MGS 4 would have to sell 2 million copies and KZ2 would have to sell 2 million copies. MGS 4 has already sold 4 million copies, so it is probably making a profit and it looks to me to be fairly likely that KZ2 will sell more than 2 million copies.

Your assumptions are very poor ...

First off, Killzone 2 and Metal Gear Solid 4 have had some of the largest development and marketing budgets of the generation and a $60 Million combined budget for each game seems like a massive underestimate. After all, Killzone 2 was estimated at 45 Million Euros before it saw a year delay, and Konami bragged about a 200+ person development team on Metal Gear Solid 4 which took over 3 years to complete.

Beyond that, selling a game for $60 in store would translate to (close to) $25 revenue for a third party publisher after retailer profit, physical costs (production and distribution), and licencing fees; it would be more for a first party game, but any assumption that is beyond $35 is laughable.

If Konami needed to double their costs to justify Metal Gear Solid 4 being made, Metal Gear Solid 4 would never have been produced ...

If MGS 4 cost $100 million to make, then it would need to make $200 million to earn the right profit. And 4 million sold at $60 would take it past that number.

I am basing these assumptions on a documentary I watched about the making of Peter Jackson's King Kong. They talked about how much money it cost to make the film, then they said in order for it to earn a profit it had to make twice what it cost to make the movie.

A bomb would mean it didn't make a profit, and it's safe to say that's not true about both those games. Even if it was a little profit.

      Well, they're working on it.  MGS 4 will be selling more copies as a greatest hits game when the PS3's audience goes over 5 million in Japan probably by the end of March 2010 following the releases of GT5 and FFXIII as PS3 exclusives in Japan later this year.

      And, Killzone 2 might not appeal so much to Japanese gamers for it to get a real boost in sales as the PS3's Japanese sales numbers continue to grow.  However the strengthened support from Japanese devleopers for the PS3 which will be coming the PS3's way in the wake of the sales growth I mentioned previously that will cause definite distinction between the PS3 and 360 libraries later in this gen may lead more people to pick up Killzone 2 later in the gen.

    Of course, I don't know how much it cost to make either MGS4 or KZ2.  If it cost 60 million to make both MGS4 and KZ2.  Then priced at $60.00 at launch, if they sold 1 million copies each they would be breaking even at one million sales, but to get the satisfactory profit I wrote about before, then MGS 4 would have to sell 2 million copies and KZ2 would have to sell 2 million copies.  MGS 4 has already sold 4 million copies, so it is probably making a profit and it looks to me to be fairly likely that KZ2 will sell more than 2 million copies.

     Basically any game or blockbuster movie needs to make back twice what it cost to make to make a profit for its creator and to have money for them to make a sequel.

It doesn't seem that unreasonable to me at all to think that: leaving aside the HD vs. SD aspect, VC was made by a team whose history includes high-profile hits (the Sakura Wars series, which spawned its own cafe), while Madworld was the side-project of a new studio. VC has an anime in the works (much like Sakura Wars) and had its own advertising campaign (it's even had a new campaign recently, especially in Japan). It's clear that there were fairly high hopes pinned on VC, especially in comparison to Madworld, and I'd be stunned if the costs didn't reflect that.