A single bag of gold is no longer enough for the latest AAA games like God of War Ragnarok.
Gamers still often fret about increased video game prices, especially given that the industry’s sales are increasing year after year, as at extra is to be observed. At the same time, however, the development costs for new games are also increasing.
Ex-Sony President Shuhei Yoshida has now Interviewed by The Guardian gave a few more precise figures in order to be able to better assess the extent. The example: God of War Ragnarok.
That’s how much God of War cost
If you compare today’s costs with those of twelve years ago, then it is now almost five times as expensive become, claims Shuhei Yoshida. For God of War 3 from 2010, $44 million was enough, while God of War Ragnarök, released in 2022, needed around $200 million.
You can see what a game produced with a blockbuster budget looks like in the test video:
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God of War Ragnarök – Our spoiler-free test video for the action-adventure masterpiece – Our spoiler-free test video for the action-adventure masterpiece
The prices from back then are simply not achievable with other major productions either: Forspoken cost around 100 million dollars, similar to Shadow of the Tomb Raider. Cyberpunk 2077 came to about 170 million, not even including the marketing costs of almost 140 million.
Shuhei Yoshida therefore shows due respect for all the indie developers who push through despite the high costs:
Funding games is difficult. But even if you make a great game, there are so many great games out there that no one knows about. The good news is that there are now really good, high-quality indie publishers out there. (…)
The industry is growing and growing and I hope it continues to support and follow creative ideas and people trying to work on new things.
Games are almost five times as expensive as they were back then, but the price increases for consumers seem comparatively manageable. 70 instead of 60 euros are often the standard full price today.
The fact that there is still polyphonic criticism from gamers is likely to be related to the constantly growing sales in the video game industry, which in turn enable larger production budgets.
