In addition to price increases as I noted for AAA games at retail, the costs of producing games have also increased massively. Unfortunately, these cost increases can cause special consequences for the gaming industry, and perhaps some have already experienced them.
So if you’re wondering what the consequences are of rising game production costs, and how it affects games, even if the price is $69.99, we can help.
1. More Companies to Aggressively Monetize Games
Unfortunately, one of the most common effects is the rise in development costs for the game monetization industry, and you’ve already experienced the problems caused by microtransactions.
But with AAA games like Halo Infinite reportedly costing over $500 million to develop, according to Game RantIt is not surprising that production companies seek to earn money through other means than physical sales.
If you take these productions literally, 343 Industries had lots to prove with Halo Infinite. Unsurprisingly, the game launched with intensive monetization of weapons, color shaders, in-game hunting, and transition into combat.
After all, these opportunities to earn money make Halo Infinity more likely Microsoft and 343 Industries, but at the expense of knowing and enjoying the Halo experience.
However, 343 Industries was hit hard by layoffs at Microsoft, so Microsoft’s Halo Infinite would have been unsuccessful despite its monetization. But this highlights the rise of funding as having a curious effect on the industry: it encourages developers to incorporate monetization gains with respect to potential losses to the game itself.
2. Games Fundamentally Change the Appeal of a Wider Audience
As monetization is required as costs and profitability expectations rise, changing the fundamentals of the game is also required for a wider audience.
According to Final Fantasy XVI developer Naoki Yoshida in an interview with Indian gamegame development has become such an “effort” that the cost of producing a Final Fantasy game can be upwards of $100 million, and that in order to win free development, you need as many people as possible to play your game.
While you may have experienced one of the many installments of Final Fantasy, Final Fantasy XVI marks a major change for the franchise, with the classic combat-based gameplay removed in favor of action-based gameplay like Bayonetta.
It is logical that action-only gyms are readily available and widely played as tournaments, allowing a wider audience of players. This, in turn, would increase profit margins: with stronger players comes stronger sales.
Due to rising production costs, Final Fantasy franchises with long expectations from fans are forced to adapt more mechanics. As development costs rise, the need for widely transparent brands becomes almost essential for a game to be financially viable.
3. The game should be pushed to become a live service
In another way, the rising production costs of the video game industry may affect the game industry, encouraging more games to adopt a survival model that allows long-term profit.
And while it can generate monetization profits as long as the game is popular, a game service designed to live guarantees a profit as long as the service lasts.
In general, the way the game service works ensures that new content is released over a much longer period of time than usual per game. You may find yourself playing the game for many years as a live service that maintains the game’s popularity with recent content.
In terms of profitability, this ensures that all salable parts of the game, monetization, combat, releases, expansions, DLC, can continue for years and meet development costs.
According to Geoff Keighley in TwitterThe CEO of EA stated that 71% of the revenue for EA comes from live gaming services, showing that it is a good method of combating the rising costs of gaming.
According to the industry, rising costs are pushing more games to incorporate useful mechanics, features, and services. And with live titles, in theory, providing profitability for many years, it is no wonder that the industry is changing the feature and prioritizing live games.
4. Popular Educational Trends Become Common
In the same vein as challenging the audience, the pressure of increasing costs may push the industry to promote the most popular gambling trends that are available at the time of release.
Depending on which platform you choose to play, you will experience numerous games, regardless of genre, common formats and services. Whether you’re looking at combat transitions, Royale game modes, or even currency mechanics, they’re almost universally put into games.
But if you look at games with high development costs, elements are almost always incorporated into the popular industry with tried and tested game mechanics. Call of Mercy: Black Ops 4 added a battle royale mode to the game with Blackout, and Halo Infinite became a live and incorporeal battle pass.
Unfortunately, while this may mean that production companies can afford to add features and services to expensive popular games, it means for you that common features are becoming saturated in the industry.
Presaturation of tried and tested gambling practices can guarantee audiences and profits, and help to alleviate the financial burden of expensive development, but there is a risk of making gambling practices stale and overused. So you can see the rise of the optional mind model in the industry that follows popular trends.
5. High Cost Games to Have Restrictive Development Times
Another way that increasing costs can affect the gambling industry is through restrictive development practices that can suppress expensive games from development, causing more issues.
If you follow massive game releases like Cyberpunk 2077, and well-known franchises like Final Fantasy, you’ll be well used to the delays. Cyberpunk 2077 was delayed three times before it was released and did so in an unfinished and buggy state.
However, while games like Cyberpunk 2077 certainly need extra development time, more development time means more support for the growth of the industry. Because of these ever-new costs, the game has to be released in a reasonable time, or maybe it is released despite the glaring issues, like Cyberpunk 2077 .
In addition to Cyberpunk 2077, if you’ve played Final Fantasy XV, you’ve experienced a perfect example of this phenomenon. Final Fantasy XV was in development for 10 years with many iterations, but was finally released incomplete at many intervals in its history.
Ironically, Final Fantasy XV dealt with its missing content through industry practices and the rise of free casinos: by adding a monetized service where content could be added to the game over time if you wanted to pay.
Industry, this is an example where game development is at a constant pace with rising costs. And if the game loses development costs, you may find your experience worse due to bugs, while you are forced to pay for the missing content in the way of monetization.
Rising Forum fees are radically changing the game
Now that you know some of the most common ways in which gambling costs affect the gambling industry, hopefully you can gain more insight into why certain gaming practices, such as microtransactions or development delays, can be intrinsically linked to exponential costs.
Unfortunately, while microtransactions are known to negatively affect the industry, rising costs can help produce AAA blockbuster titles, but could also restrict various aspects of the game and ultimately hurt the industry further.
