SmokedMeat
Gamer™
Congrats to the team. Patiently waiting for the PC version.
TLoU2 surpassed many things in preorders and release-day purchases, i.e. purchases made out of goodwill and faith that the 1st game generated.
But most of all, let's not pretend this isn't a thing:
A full year? It hasn't even been 3 months.Not even a full year out yet - WOW
Had to check and make sure I wasn't in the TLOU HBO threadThink of all the crevices that have been squeezed through.
TLOU2's underperformance had nothing to do with its gameplay. The gameplay was ace, and I haven't played as mechanically engaging and well designed game since. The story and the leaks are really what fucked that game over.Naughty Dog needs to up their game
TLOU 2 was divisive and the gameplay structure wasn’t improved much (and it needs lots of improving)
The God of War formula/design structure is more appealing
It's more appealing yes, but not by much. TLOU sold 20 million just like GOW. The sequel underperformed despite being more open and longer. I can see why GOW would outsell TLOU Part 2, but to completely obliterate it in 2 months shows that either TLOU massively underperformed or GOW overperformed. I think GOW is performing like a sequel to a 20 million hit normally would.TLOU p2 was too linear with the same formula and had no MP
GowR is a more massive game, and I’d say more appealing in general
I reckon it's 80-90%. Miles Morales was getting a solid 75% skew nearer it's release.If it's anything like other crossgen titles, it's probably about 70/30 PS5 to PS4.
Also bundle sales typically aren't counted in these sales numbers. So counting bundles it's well over 11 million.
That was true when dev cost were low around $20-40 million. you really dont need to spend Avatar's marketing budget to market games. Games have a very niche market still.
They want us to think game dev costs are insanely high nowadays but first party games dont cost that much. In the PS3 era, ND made Uncharted games and TLOU for $20 million each. Lets assume the costs have doubled since. Thats $40 million. Lets assume they have tripled or quadrupled. you are still at $80 million.
GOW3 cost $44 million in 2010. Double it and you are around $90 million. $150 million to make a game in 200-300 person studio is just way too much.
Horzon cost $47 million euros in 2017. And that game was in development for six years. I can promise you that despite the 5 year dev cycle and more devs on the project, it is not even close to costing $100 million. With marketing sure.
Not every employee works full time on the project. $270M production cost sounds very unlikely when Horizon Zero Down from 2017 was only in the $50M ballpark.Dev costs are that expensive
SSM is like 400 employees in an expensive part of the country
Assuming average spend per employee including benefits, overhead, etc is 150,000 per year (not what they get paid, just total average cost including everything) that’s 4.5 years x 400 employees x 150,000 = 270M
This is insanely high so either my average cost per employee needs a haircut or the number of employees does.
But even reducing it to 100,000 and 250 employees is over 110M
This doesn’t even include all the external costs (partners at other studios).
So yeah, these games do really cost 150-200M and are a lot more expensive than early PS3 era.
This is what Shawn Layden was talking about
Here’s an article about CP2077, total budget (incl marketing) of $316 million. No, these numbers are quickly becoming the norm and will keep going up as long as the sales ceiling is high. I don’t think Ragnarok’s production values and marketing push was that far behind cp2077 but my guess it’s closer to that number than $150M.Calm down will ya, I think the total budget wouldn't surpass $150m. What titles had a budget of $400m? That sounds ludicrous.
I doubt God of War was anywhere near Cyberpunk in cost. The marketing for Cyberpunk was far bigger, the game is several times the size of GOW with more voice actors, it's open world, got hundreds of intertwining systems and completely dwarfs GOWR in terms of complexity, scope, and scale. Games like Cyberpunk and RDR2 are in a class of their own in terms of budget. There's no reason for GOW to even have a budget half as big.Here’s an article about CP2077, total budget (incl marketing) of $316 million. No, these numbers are quickly becoming the norm and will keep going up as long as the sales ceiling is high. I don’t think Ragnarok’s production values and marketing push was that far behind cp2077 but my guess it’s closer to that number than $150M.
https://www.gamesindustry.biz/cd-projekt-refunded-around-30-000-cyberpunk-2077-copies
$150 million total was a big budget game like 10 years ago.
Same, clocked around 48 hours to get it and didn't play anything else because I was enjoying it so much. Plat or not, I would still like to see a NG+ added.Got the plat and I really enjoyed it.
Think of all the crevices that have been squeezed through.
Thats way too much. $270 million is approaching RDR2 costs which had ALL 7 Rockstar studios and some 3,000 employees working on it for 5 full years. By your math, that game would've cost what? $2 billion?Dev costs are that expensive
SSM is like 400 employees in an expensive part of the country
Assuming average spend per employee including benefits, overhead, etc is 150,000 per year (not what they get paid, just total average cost including everything) that’s 4.5 years x 400 employees x 150,000 = 270M
This is insanely high so either my average cost per employee needs a haircut or the number of employees does.
But even reducing it to 100,000 and 250 employees is over 110M
This doesn’t even include all the external costs (partners at other studios).
So yeah, these games do really cost 150-200M and are a lot more expensive than early PS3 era.
This is what Shawn Layden was talking about
Yeah, I wish we had more of this. Any time a developer mentions planned DLC, I think ‘wait for the complete edition’. I’d rather know I’m buying the complete package outright, and that’s got to help sales even just a bit.Exclusive single player game with insane production values. Ultra polished and refined since launch. No mtx, no dlc, no bloat, no bullshit. Deserved outcome.
The industry needs more of this.
Thats way too much. $270 million is approaching RDR2 costs which had ALL 7 Rockstar studios and some 3,000 employees working on it for 5 full years. By your math, that game would've cost what? $2 billion?
But neither of us know the true costs thanks to sony no longer revealing game budgets like they did with Uncharted, TLOU, and GOW3, so lets agree to disagree. I just refuse to believe that the same studio that made GOW3 in 2010 with just $44 million is now at $270 million.
Returnal sold 500k copies in the first three months. Thats a 100 person studio and it took them 5 years to make the game. By your math, it shouldve cost $75 million. It made $35 million and Sony considered it a success. They literally bought the studio. Come on. The budget for that game was probably 10-20 million max.
Yes they sold 2 million copies and 9 million bundles. Go away.God of War is a longer running franchise, going back almost 20 years, with over 10 releases.
One had leaks. The other had none. One was bundled the other wasn't.
Of course it'll sell more.
With marketing, sure. For just production? Unlikely. A production cost between $80-100 sounds plausible. With another $100M for marketing. Total plus marketing might be $150M-200M.GOW3 isn’t in the same Galaxy of effort compared to GoW:R
One is a 7 hour game the other is 60+ hours worth of content
Returnal probably did cost 50-75M
The bottom line is Ragnarok cost bare minimum 150M
I doubt God of War was anywhere near Cyberpunk in cost. The marketing for Cyberpunk was far bigger, the game is several times the size of GOW with more voice actors, it's open world, got hundreds of intertwining systems and completely dwarfs GOWR in terms of complexity, scope, and scale. Games like Cyberpunk and RDR2 are in a class of their own in terms of budget. There's no reason for GOW to even have a budget half as big.
Here’s an article about CP2077, total budget (incl marketing) of $316 million. No, these numbers are quickly becoming the norm and will keep going up as long as the sales ceiling is high. I don’t think Ragnarok’s production values and marketing push was that far behind cp2077 but my guess it’s closer to that number than $150M.
https://www.gamesindustry.biz/cd-projekt-refunded-around-30-000-cyberpunk-2077-copies
$150 million total was a big budget game like 10 years ago.
With marketing, sure. For just production? Unlikely.
Yes they sold 2 million copies and 9 million bundles. Go away.
It doesn't work like that. You don't just take every employee and multiply them to extrapolate a guesstimate. This is ridiculous.Returnal was like 3 years, 100 employees, 100k per = 30M dev budget
Sounds right
It doesn't work like that. You don't just take every employee and multiply them to extrapolate a guesstimate. This is ridiculous.
TLOU2 was my GOTY and i love the franchise, but it's silly to stick your head in the sand and pretend that a game that sold 4 million in 3 days and topped out at 9 million after 2 years did not underperform. Ragnorak is showing how to take an insane opening weekend and then explode into 11 million sales in just under 3 months. TLOU2 almost flatlined in comparison.Always fun to see these salty boys who still can't get over TLOU 2
TLOU2 was my GOTY and i love the franchise, but it's silly to stick your head in the sand and pretend that a game that sold 4 million in 3 days and topped out at 9 million after 2 years did not underperform. Ragnorak is showing how to take an insane opening weekend and then explode into 11 million sales in just under 3 months. TLOU2 almost flatlined in comparison.
I really dont understand why we cant simply talk about this stuff without being labeled concern trolls or salty. This is a 37 million selling franchise. It's huge. The fact that the sequel sold just under 9 million is something that bears pointing out at the very least.
I really hope Neil and ND dont ignore all the concerns people had with the game. There are real issues with the narrative structure and the lack of likeable characters. If they are going to ignore user reviews on metacritic as troll reviews, and ignore the lack of legs in sales then they are going to continue to make the same mistakes over and over again.
And I say this as a die-hard MGS fan who disliked then loved MGS2 but was sad to see Snake Eater sell well below what MGS2 did despite being a much better game. Backlashes do hurt these games.
Always fun to see these salty boys who still can't get over TLOU 2
lol $10 million was the budget for Metal Gear Solid 2 in 2001. I don’t think a lot of people understand how expensive it is to employ these giant teams and build huge games with tons of content, high quality voice acting, cinematics that look movie quality, tons of testing and iteration over years, and put in a massive marketing push behind them. These games are really really REALLY big business, it’s not 1997 anymore, it stands to reason the budget is going to go up to match. The cost to so business is high and the sales numbers for hit games justify those expenses.Thats way too much. $270 million is approaching RDR2 costs which had ALL 7 Rockstar studios and some 3,000 employees working on it for 5 full years. By your math, that game would've cost what? $2 billion?
But neither of us know the true costs thanks to sony no longer revealing game budgets like they did with Uncharted, TLOU, and GOW3, so lets agree to disagree. I just refuse to believe that the same studio that made GOW3 in 2010 with just $44 million is now at $270 million.
Returnal sold 500k copies in the first three months. Thats a 100 person studio and it took them 5 years to make the game. By your math, it shouldve cost $75 million. It made $35 million and Sony considered it a success. They literally bought the studio. Come on. The budget for that game was probably 10-20 million max.
I'm just salty I was still forced to kill the goodest of game doggos, Alice.Always fun to see these salty boys who still can't get over TLOU 2
I really wonder how many God of War bundles they sold. I have not seen a single non bundled PS5 in November and December.The Last of Us was bundled for years, and there's no doubt that without the God of war bundles, it would still be under 10 million. To show you how much of a factor the bundled played a part in The Last of Us sales, The Last of Us Part II surpassed The PS4 remaster version in less than 3 weeks on the NPD chats, and the game sold over 12 million copies on that platform.
There's no putting this one on ice. Expand to a new location and have that bad boi out by the end of this gen/start of next-gen!TLOu2 really did a number on the simple folk. Massive success on that metric alone.
Anyway God of War is a mega franchise now.
TLOU 2 was over 10 million. And it continues to chart. It didn’t top at 9 million.TLOU2 was my GOTY and i love the franchise, but it's silly to stick your head in the sand and pretend that a game that sold 4 million in 3 days and topped out at 9 million after 2 years did not underperform. Ragnorak is showing how to take an insane opening weekend and then explode into 11 million sales in just under 3 months. TLOU2 almost flatlined in comparison.
I really dont understand why we cant simply talk about this stuff without being labeled concern trolls or salty. This is a 37 million selling franchise. It's huge. The fact that the sequel sold just under 9 million is something that bears pointing out at the very least.
I really hope Neil and ND dont ignore all the concerns people had with the game. There are real issues with the narrative structure and the lack of likeable characters. If they are going to ignore user reviews on metacritic as troll reviews, and ignore the lack of legs in sales then they are going to continue to make the same mistakes over and over again.
And I say this as a die-hard MGS fan who disliked then loved MGS2 but was sad to see Snake Eater sell well below what MGS2 did despite being a much better game. Backlashes do hurt these games.