I feel the 10k a month is too high and i base my thoughts on the old EA scandal of not paying anyone overtime for many years.Deeper into the article also revealed that EA was hiring a lot of people right out of school because they are desperate for work,will do near anything asked and will work a lot cheaper.
Thinking along those same lines,i would say a lot lower but then i just remembered what my boss said we cost him per/hr.If you make $35/hr it costs your boss around $80/hour depending on various factors like company vehicles/gas/expenses,travel costs etc etc.Well simple math says that is 3200 a week for 40 hours.So yeah now that i think about it 10k is a very good ballpark figure to use.
This is likely why we do not see many games that look like more than 6 months work at best.
As to SC,well first of all i would say that Robert's lied about what he could build the game for in his original pitches.If we figure a team of say 100 nothing amazingly big and figure the same costs,that is easily 1 mil/mnth w/o adding in any other expenses,like dude traveling around on jets with his wife etc etc.
To further my point,his original pitch was 6 million,so Robert's was telling us he could build an amazing game in around 10 months roflamo,so yeah ,he is a good BS'r.Then it further pisses me off that Angry Joe whom i used to respect all calling this game the best ever,like a god send and was really looking forward to it,umm yeah he was expecting a great game like SC to built in 10 months?So there has been a lot of bull and lot of marketing ploys enabled by the SC team to mislead people.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Based on wikipedia GTAV development cost without marketing was 137 million
Both of those numbers for GTA V you posted are speculations and/or estimations. You even failed to mention that they're just estimations and presented them as facts.
Again, we are talking confirmed development budgets. Some companies are publically traded or have some other reasons to disclose costs. Other do not.
So in light of how many estimations you've posted and the manner in which you've done it I think you should stop bitching others about their use of estimations.
There is also an interview of Robert's talking about his old days while running Digital Anvil and he failed back then.He never finished a single game,ran the business dry then sold out to Microsoft and went after other publishers to help finish his work that Microsoft didn't want.
CR: It's very difficult to build wildly ambitious games without the financial security of a larger company, especially when their development cycles are so unpredictable. Freelancer was meant to take three years - it will probably be four and a half years by the time it is done. It's very tough for an independent developer to weather that kind of slip, and it's not just Digital Anvil. I believe all A+ games require severe patience and funds - witness Team Fortress 2 and Black & White.
So he was taking too long back then which is very similar to now.So using his own words,he is likely financially killing this business but keeping it in the hype to likely sellout once again to a publisher.However he has the one added benefit of addicted spenders that keep buying every new ship he throws up for sale,so the money keeps rolling in.
FOOLISH spenders do not make great games,they make rich businessmen.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
There is also an interview of Robert's talking about his old days while running Digital Anvil and he failed back then.He never finished a single game,ran the business dry then sold out to Microsoft and went after other publishers to help finish his work that Microsoft didn't want.
CR: It's very difficult to build wildly ambitious games without the financial security of a larger company, especially when their development cycles are so unpredictable. Freelancer was meant to take three years - it will probably be four and a half years by the time it is done. It's very tough for an independent developer to weather that kind of slip, and it's not just Digital Anvil. I believe all A+ games require severe patience and funds - witness Team Fortress 2 and Black & White.
So he was taking too long back then which is very similar to now.So using his own words,he is likely financially killing this business but keeping it in the hype to likely sellout once again to a publisher.However he has the one added benefit of addicted spenders that keep buying every new ship he throws up for sale,so the money keeps rolling in.
FOOLISH spenders do not make great games,they make rich businessmen.
Well that's certainly one way to look at it. If there is more in that interview to support that he "failed" then fine but what I'm seeing is that to make something that is ambitions it takes time and money.
Having done a lot of creation over my life I can tell you that it does take time and money and if one is ambitious then that adds to the time.
Whether or not he will be successful now that he is running his own ship with full authority and supposedly more money remains to be seen.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
So funny to see all the assumptions people make regarding where the money goes for this game and what it costs to develop a game...
And why wouldn't they have a budget for marketing? They send newsletters, post blogs, make vlogs and live streams. Everything can't and is not going fully towards the development of the game, else it would die.
Also, comparing game dev costs for a game 20 years ago to now is delusional. The amount of physics, artwork etc. that is put into Star Citizen is beyond most games out today. So far they've done a great job. Let's hope they can finish it.
Page 9 shows a gross loss of over 300,000 euros and cost of sales at 15 million for just that one office.
If things are still running like this and the other offices are in similar financial shape, these guys are holding on by a thread. 30 million coming in a year and profit is only 200k. What will they do when they have to hire a bunch of support staff and server hosting when the game launches?
It is stuff like this that makes me almost certain they will add a subscription fee to this game. Once this game launches and supposedly people can work hard to earn everything in the game the cash shop will not be able to sustain this monster. It works now because people can not earn things in the game yet.
(I am still baffled how administrative EXPENSES of 600,000 can ADD to profit at the end though. Guess I will have to dust off those boring finance books)
"Sean (Murray) saying MP will be in the game is not remotely close to evidence that at the point of purchase people thought there was MP in the game." - SEANMCAD
...the only ambitious effort here is, is to turn the mess Roberts is causing into something workable.
SC isn't ambitious, it is poorly designed and managed project....likely like most Robert's endeavors, ie. Freelancer.
That's why the games he worked on, including Wing Commander were considered ambitious and unique at their time, and today are games of reference in the space sim genre.
If things are still running like this and the other offices are in similar financial shape, these guys are holding on by a thread. 30 million coming in a year and profit is only 200k. What will they do when they have to hire a bunch of support staff and server hosting when the game launches?
They already hired LiveOps, they already pay server hosting and maintain its infrastructure, they already have a CS team, the live service is maintained side by side with its development.
Sovrath said: but what I'm seeing is that to make something that is ambitions it takes time and money.
...the only ambitious effort here is, is to turn the mess Roberts is causing into something workable.
SC isn't ambitious, it is poorly designed and managed project....likely like most Robert's endeavors, ie. Freelancer.
Seems pretty ambitious to me. A space game and a planetary game with avatars. I mean, I don't see any games that really offer that other than No man's sky which doesn't seem to offer more than exploring (?).
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
>>> You sure that is the report you want to use? >>>
That IS the official report.
>>> If things are still running like this and the other offices are in similar financial shape >>>
The parent company gets most of the money and has much less employees. I think some of the other offices are in excellent financial shape and can transfer funds as necessary.
Foundry 42 UK is the workhorse and has the highest operating cost.
I am not an expert in company finances - may someone else with more knowledge go over the numbers. I guess it only shows part of the picture, as there are other sister and parent companies involved in other countries when it comes to the big picture. The numbers have been independently audited and deemed correct, if i read the report correctly.
I mean, I don't see any games that really offer that other than No man's sky which doesn't seem to offer more than exploring (?).
I don't see any other jelly monster truck racing game either, if I am make one, does it mean it will be considered ambitious...?
But given that we have "space games" and that players have clamored for both a "space and ground game", even in EVE, it seems that no developer has been able to provide both.
Also, a Jelly monster truck racing game wouldn't be ambitions. A Jelly monster truck racing game that has a whole "run a racing team" component in addition to the racing part would be.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
Again, we are talking confirmed development budgets. Some companies are publically traded or have some other reasons to disclose costs. Other do not.
SWTOR and Destiny are indeed rumored to have had huge budgets. Destiny some say 500 million.
<snip>
Well the person who provided the 500M figure for Destiny was the then CEO of Activision - so not just any "some say" person.
However the $500M was given as a number that Destiny would/might cost Activision. It was never really clear what exactly these costs covered but lets assume that Bungie have all the costs and Activision pay Bungie. Remember Bungie made Destiny not Activision.
So Destiny will have cost Bungie $X to make and Activision will have paid ($X + Bungie profit). Pick your own number for profit but if it worked out at 50% then that would be c. $325M cost and $175M profit for Bungie.
No idea what the profit would be or whether Activision cover some of the costs etc. but this demonstrates just how hard it is.
According to your proposed argument above - no other game has done it, it would. Hence why I am pointing it out as falacious...
Completely ignoring the technical difficulty of your project... Undertaking high difficulty is ambition, not just "this brand new feature nobody ever did before!".
The parent company gets most of the money and has much less employees. I think some of the other offices are in excellent financial shape and can transfer funds as necessary.
Do you have a source for any of this?
"Sean (Murray) saying MP will be in the game is not remotely close to evidence that at the point of purchase people thought there was MP in the game." - SEANMCAD
If things are still running like this and the other offices are in similar financial shape, these guys are holding on by a thread. 30 million coming in a year and profit is only 200k. What will they do when they have to hire a bunch of support staff and server hosting when the game launches?
They already hired LiveOps, they already pay server hosting and maintain its infrastructure, they already have a CS team, the live service is maintained side by side with its development.
So you are saying they are currently paying for as many support people and live servers now as they will need when the game goes live?
"Sean (Murray) saying MP will be in the game is not remotely close to evidence that at the point of purchase people thought there was MP in the game." - SEANMCAD
Sovrath said: but what I'm seeing is that to make something that is ambitions it takes time and money.
...the only ambitious effort here is, is to turn the mess Roberts is causing into something workable.
SC isn't ambitious, it is poorly designed and managed project....likely like most Robert's endeavors, ie. Freelancer.
There have been those who have said this game is impossible, so has it been done before? Regardless of the perception of how you believe the game to be managed or designed, I think that saying it isn't ambitious considering the number of articles written about how the things they are doing either cannot be done or are not feasible to do would suggest that it's, if nothing else, ambitious. Suggesting otherwise simply hurts your credibility.
So you are saying they are currently paying for as many support people and live servers now as they will need when the game goes live?
When the game goes live and many more people get in, only logical revenue also will, as with any game title, so it will be a matter of scaling the setup they already have to sustain that.
Also, a Jelly monster truck racing game wouldn't be ambitions.
According to your proposed argument above - no other game has done it, it would. Hence why I am pointing it out as falacious...
Racing games have been done so changing what type of racing vehicle doesn't seem ambitious. The features being added and the scope of the project is what makes it ambitious.
So a Barbi rock em sock em robot fighting game has never been done. But if one were to just slap a barbi skin on any of the released fighting games then not really ambitions. It's not been done but that would not make it ambitious.
However, adding multiple components that stretch what a fighting game is, especially in "the barbi world" would be ambitious.
So again, it's the scope of the project, not that it hasn't been done.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
However, adding multiple components that stretch what a fighting game is, especially in "the barbi world" would be ambitious.
You are still rehearsing same argument.... "it has not been done before".
Let me help you out...
Space sim was done before, FPS has been done before but slapping those together is supposed to be "ambitious" ? It isn't, it is just expensive due amount of content you need to produce - since they are separate gameplays.
Other games has done it before(avatar + space ship gameplay) and they suffered same issue due to their shoe string budget - lack of content. You named such example yourself, No Man's Sky.
The reason why avatar + space ships aren't being done isn't technical difficulty but budget restrains. The main reason
imo is design - you get out of your ship and do what?
Design is likely the most difficult part, coming up with some compelling content that would fit in along with space sim gameplay part is the tough one, and indeed ambitious. Slapping FPS onto space sim? Not so much, it will just cost you a fortune since you will need to produce content for 2 games.
Again, nothing about SC is "ambitious"...well, you can view an effort to hammer a nail with a screwdriver as ambitious but most people would consider it just stupid.
Sovrath said: but what I'm seeing is that to make something that is ambitions it takes time and money.
...the only ambitious effort here is, is to turn the mess Roberts is causing into something workable.
SC isn't ambitious, it is poorly designed and managed project....likely like most Robert's endeavors, ie. Freelancer.
There have been those who have said this game is impossible, so has it been done before? Regardless of the perception of how you believe the game to be managed or designed, I think that saying it isn't ambitious considering the number of articles written about how the things they are doing either cannot be done or are not feasible to do would suggest that it's, if nothing else, ambitious. Suggesting otherwise simply hurts your credibility.
Seriously though, I don't know how you lol that when it's the truth. You can say plenty about how horribly managed the project has been, and you can actually find some evidence to that, suggesting that character models were taking 3 times what they should to get into the game.
Yes, SC is ambitious, if not with complete disregard for anything anybody tells them. CIG is like the teenager of the game development industry. If it's not ambitious, I'd love to hear why, or what you feel is ambitious, because if SC isn't ambitious I obviously don't know what your definition of ambitious is.
Comments
Not exactly Massively Multiplayer is it.
A creative person is motivated by the desire to achieve, not the desire to beat others.
Thinking along those same lines,i would say a lot lower but then i just remembered what my boss said we cost him per/hr.If you make $35/hr it costs your boss around $80/hour depending on various factors like company vehicles/gas/expenses,travel costs etc etc.Well simple math says that is 3200 a week for 40 hours.So yeah now that i think about it 10k is a very good ballpark figure to use.
This is likely why we do not see many games that look like more than 6 months work at best.
As to SC,well first of all i would say that Robert's lied about what he could build the game for in his original pitches.If we figure a team of say 100 nothing amazingly big and figure the same costs,that is easily 1 mil/mnth w/o adding in any other expenses,like dude traveling around on jets with his wife etc etc.
To further my point,his original pitch was 6 million,so Robert's was telling us he could build an amazing game in around 10 months roflamo,so yeah ,he is a good BS'r.Then it further pisses me off that Angry Joe whom i used to respect all calling this game the best ever,like a god send and was really looking forward to it,umm yeah he was expecting a great game like SC to built in 10 months?So there has been a lot of bull and lot of marketing ploys enabled by the SC team to mislead people.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Both of those numbers for GTA V you posted are speculations and/or estimations. You even failed to mention that they're just estimations and presented them as facts. So in light of how many estimations you've posted and the manner in which you've done it I think you should stop bitching others about their use of estimations.
CR: It's very difficult to build wildly ambitious games without the financial security of a larger company, especially when their development cycles are so unpredictable. Freelancer was meant to take three years - it will probably be four and a half years by the time it is done. It's very tough for an independent developer to weather that kind of slip, and it's not just Digital Anvil. I believe all A+ games require severe patience and funds - witness Team Fortress 2 and Black & White.
So he was taking too long back then which is very similar to now.So using his own words,he is likely financially killing this business but keeping it in the hype to likely sellout once again to a publisher.However he has the one added benefit of addicted spenders that keep buying every new ship he throws up for sale,so the money keeps rolling in.
FOOLISH spenders do not make great games,they make rich businessmen.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/08815227/filing-history
Have fun
Having done a lot of creation over my life I can tell you that it does take time and money and if one is ambitious then that adds to the time.
Whether or not he will be successful now that he is running his own ship with full authority and supposedly more money remains to be seen.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
And why wouldn't they have a budget for marketing? They send newsletters, post blogs, make vlogs and live streams. Everything can't and is not going fully towards the development of the game, else it would die.
Also, comparing game dev costs for a game 20 years ago to now is delusional. The amount of physics, artwork etc. that is put into Star Citizen is beyond most games out today. So far they've done a great job. Let's hope they can finish it.
SC isn't ambitious, it is poorly designed and managed project....likely like most Robert's endeavors, ie. Freelancer.
Page 9 shows a gross loss of over 300,000 euros and cost of sales at 15 million for just that one office.
If things are still running like this and the other offices are in similar financial shape, these guys are holding on by a thread. 30 million coming in a year and profit is only 200k. What will they do when they have to hire a bunch of support staff and server hosting when the game launches?
It is stuff like this that makes me almost certain they will add a subscription fee to this game. Once this game launches and supposedly people can work hard to earn everything in the game the cash shop will not be able to sustain this monster. It works now because people can not earn things in the game yet.
(I am still baffled how administrative EXPENSES of 600,000 can ADD to profit at the end though. Guess I will have to dust off those boring finance books)
They already hired LiveOps, they already pay server hosting and maintain its infrastructure, they already have a CS team, the live service is maintained side by side with its development.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
That IS the official report.
>>> If things are still running like this and the other offices are in similar financial shape >>>
The parent company gets most of the money and has much less employees. I think some of the other offices are in excellent financial shape and can transfer funds as necessary.
Foundry 42 UK is the workhorse and has the highest operating cost.
I am not an expert in company finances - may someone else with more knowledge go over the numbers. I guess it only shows part of the picture, as there are other sister and parent companies involved in other countries when it comes to the big picture. The numbers have been independently audited and deemed correct, if i read the report correctly.
Have fun
Also, a Jelly monster truck racing game wouldn't be ambitions. A Jelly monster truck racing game that has a whole "run a racing team" component in addition to the racing part would be.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
However the $500M was given as a number that Destiny would/might cost Activision. It was never really clear what exactly these costs covered but lets assume that Bungie have all the costs and Activision pay Bungie. Remember Bungie made Destiny not Activision.
So Destiny will have cost Bungie $X to make and Activision will have paid ($X + Bungie profit). Pick your own number for profit but if it worked out at 50% then that would be c. $325M cost and $175M profit for Bungie.
No idea what the profit would be or whether Activision cover some of the costs etc. but this demonstrates just how hard it is.
(Assuming they've always spent 10k per month per employee, and given the ramp-up in employees towards the current employee count)
Anyone have solid facts to calculate this?
There have been those who have said this game is impossible, so has it been done before? Regardless of the perception of how you believe the game to be managed or designed, I think that saying it isn't ambitious considering the number of articles written about how the things they are doing either cannot be done or are not feasible to do would suggest that it's, if nothing else, ambitious. Suggesting otherwise simply hurts your credibility.
Crazkanuk
----------------
Azarelos - 90 Hunter - Emerald
Durnzig - 90 Paladin - Emerald
Demonicron - 90 Death Knight - Emerald Dream - US
Tankinpain - 90 Monk - Azjol-Nerub - US
Brindell - 90 Warrior - Emerald Dream - US
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So a Barbi rock em sock em robot fighting game has never been done. But if one were to just slap a barbi skin on any of the released fighting games then not really ambitions. It's not been done but that would not make it ambitious.
However, adding multiple components that stretch what a fighting game is, especially in "the barbi world" would be ambitious.
So again, it's the scope of the project, not that it hasn't been done.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Let me help you out...
Space sim was done before, FPS has been done before but slapping those together is supposed to be "ambitious" ? It isn't, it is just expensive due amount of content you need to produce - since they are separate gameplays.
Other games has done it before(avatar + space ship gameplay) and they suffered same issue due to their shoe string budget - lack of content. You named such example yourself, No Man's Sky.
The reason why avatar + space ships aren't being done isn't technical difficulty but budget restrains. The main reason imo is design - you get out of your ship and do what?
Design is likely the most difficult part, coming up with some compelling content that would fit in along with space sim gameplay part is the tough one, and indeed ambitious. Slapping FPS onto space sim? Not so much, it will just cost you a fortune since you will need to produce content for 2 games.
Again, nothing about SC is "ambitious"...well, you can view an effort to hammer a nail with a screwdriver as ambitious but most people would consider it just stupid.
Nope! No lol! You don't lol that @Gdemami
Seriously though, I don't know how you lol that when it's the truth. You can say plenty about how horribly managed the project has been, and you can actually find some evidence to that, suggesting that character models were taking 3 times what they should to get into the game.
Yes, SC is ambitious, if not with complete disregard for anything anybody tells them. CIG is like the teenager of the game development industry. If it's not ambitious, I'd love to hear why, or what you feel is ambitious, because if SC isn't ambitious I obviously don't know what your definition of ambitious is.
Crazkanuk
----------------
Azarelos - 90 Hunter - Emerald
Durnzig - 90 Paladin - Emerald
Demonicron - 90 Death Knight - Emerald Dream - US
Tankinpain - 90 Monk - Azjol-Nerub - US
Brindell - 90 Warrior - Emerald Dream - US
----------------