Cost of Game Development is 'Crazy' Says EA

GamesIndustry.biz has the word from Alan Tascan, general manager of EA's Montreal studio, who has gone on record saying that development costs are 'crazy' in this next-gen world. From the article: "When asked whether he'd agree that it's larger companies like EA which are driving bigger game budgets, Tascan replied, 'I think a lot of [other companies] are spending even more money. It's people who want that, it's not EA per se ... I said to some of the guys here, "The gamer is not buying lines of code; you have to promise him enough entertainment for him to put his hand in his pocket and buy the game." It's a lot of money, so you need to give him a show, and we're just here to deliver the show.'"

Comments

No Problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Good thing EA only has to develop one Madden game per console.

I kid, I kid...

Re:No Problem

[eln]

Licensing.

Cry me a river...

[Joe Snipe]

You think it's pricey to make games? I have to pay $699 for the console to play them!

Re:Cry me a river...

[Osiris Ani]

Games have always been hard to produce the only difference between then and now is that they have more pixels to work with which means more graphics to create, not necessarily more gameplay.

So the physics model for Pong wasn't really all that different than that of, say, Quake 4? The greater complexity and raw power of more modern systems allow for more expansive gameplay beyond the pushing of pixels and shaders. The AI, the level of interaction with the environment, and the immersive qualities of the audio fields are only a few of the ways that games have evolved since the offerings available during my childhood.

Relegating the changes to mere visual aesthetic modifications completely discounts the capabilities that the technology allows as well as the pure academic research that led to each of these advances. From a tech-geek standpoint, your assertion is almost offensive.

Nintendo

[frederec]

Statements like these give me hope for the success of Nintendo. From what I've heard, it is far easier and cheaper to code for the Wii (and similarly the DS/GBA) than for the "true" next-gen systems. Perhaps while the large companies are making the blockbuster big-budget games, Nintendo will attract the more indy, affordable games. Then when people get more accustomed to the PS3 and 360, (perhaps) costs will come down enough to make it more reasonable.

Or maybe Xbox Live and the equivalent for the PS3 will just get an explosion of smaller games, and there will be just a small number of blockbusters coming out on the system proper.

Re:This has been bothering me for a while.

[Phydeaux314]

Why do they have to be mutually exclusive? It's possible to make games that have an entertaining plotline and decent graphics quality. I mean, Half-Life was by no means "groundbreaking" as far as graphics go, but it was still pretty - and fun to play. Hell, it was based off of a modified quake 1 engine! I think the problem lies in the development time. When a game is rushed to the door to meet an arbitrary deadline, quality suffers. 8 years ago, a normal game development cycle was about 2-3 years, tops. We all laughed at dakitana for taking 4 and a half, saying that's what killed it. Now, it seems, all the "insightful" or "groundbreaking" games spend at least that long in development. Oblivion, Half-Life 2, etc. are all good examples of this. It boils down to this: If you have enough time, you can work on eye candy AND on playability. Save the $500,000 on licensed technology for whatever and do it in-house. Not only is it easier to suit it to your needs, but it's more unique.

Spending more

[tansey]

I think a lot of [other companies] are spending even more money.

Yeah, but the other companies pay their employees overtime.

Cost factor is the same old same old...

[__aaclcg7560]

After working in the video game industry for six years at Accolade/Infogrames/Atari (same company), developing games are more expensive because the same mistakes are made every time.

• Unrealistic schedules: A marketing dweeb decides when a game should be released without taking into consideration the developer's experience level, console manufacturing requirements, and whether enough QA will be available to adequately test the title. As a lead QA tester, I routinely add two months to the schedule and my time estimates are usually 90% correct.
• Bonus Structure: The producer's bonus is tied to the unrealistic schedule and a lot of decisions are made to compromises the game so the producer can get his bonus. As a lead QA tester, I was routinely accused of denying a producer his "hard earned" bonus.
• Unrestrained QA Overtime: If a game is not properly scheduled and managed, a tremendous amount of QA overtime will go into trying to save the game and, almost always, is shipped regardless of the final quality. As a lead QA tester, I worked 28 days straight on my last project because the schedule was cut by one-third and I was not notified until half-way through the project.

I'm not holding my breath that the video game industry will one day figure out that there's a saner method for developing a video game that doesn't blow the schedule and the budget like a bad lunch at Taco Bell.

Re:Meh.

[Moofie]

"EA fits both categories, they have highly experimental games coming from studios they own like Maxis."

That's a pretty serious oversimplification. EA bought Maxis, and then tried to kill The Sims. Any "highly experimental" game that comes out of EA is an accident, not an experiment.

Re:Cry me a river...all the way to the bank!

[ubuwalker31]

Check out http://finance.google.com/finance?q=ERTS and look at EA's financials. This is the real scandal here. They brought in about $3 Billion, yes, Billion with a B, dollars in 2006. $3,000,000,000. That is a cool pile of cash. And then they spent just under half of that to make their product. Thats a lot of dough!

ea sucks

[crabpeople]

Everyone who doesn't have a negative opinion of EA doesnt know jack about games. They buy other companies, then throw out half cocked sequals that suck balls. They can't even get a good 2d UI right! Two examples. First, BF2. BF1942 was probably the best game released when it came out. It had everything, huge maps, all sorts of vehicles, it was revolutionary. Then out came the free Desert Combat mod, which improved it even further. Than DUM DUM DUM.. ea baught dice. The next game, much promise, was BF2. I baught this game from a store for about $60. It was shite. The ingame server browser didnt work, there were loads of unskippable cutscenes at the begining, and the forced GaySpy integration took forever to get working right. They even made you pay for more "advanced" weaponry, so if you wanted to be as good as otherpeople you had to pay again. Then, if you actually made it into the game, the maps were smaller than bf1942, more buggy, and the graphics didnt even scale properly. This past fall they released a new expansion intitled bf2142. They didnt even bother to fix all the problems in bf2, and I am willing to bet that bf2142 is just bf2 with some new shit tacked on.

Another example is C&C generals. Command and Conquer was one of the oldest and best RTS games out there. Red Alert was crazy intelligent and well rounded. Then you got generals. That buggy piece of shit, with the crappiest (still years after release) netcode and a myrad of design changes and bugs. They totally broke the whole c&c franchise by developing a whole new story for the universe. That game should not even be called c&c. Here is an excerpt from the wikipedia entry:

"There is also a glitch/cheat in the online play called the "SCUD bug" which allows the player of the GLA army to automatically reload their SCUD launcher shortly after it is fired. Many fans demanded Electronic Arts to fix this glitch so that online players wouldn't be given the opportunity to cheat so easily. But EA didn't respond to this call."

I mean how fucking apathetic do you have to be to not even bother fixing MAJOR exploits in the game?

EA is simply the worst about not fixing bugs. It seems as if they have a memory of 1 year. If a game is passed one year release, its time to either a) tack on an expansion b) make a sequel or c) bargain bin it and stop all development.

Like I am having trouble believing that you are not some sort of shill for EA. They ruined so many good games. UO is another one, where they decided just realeasing new art every year or so and charging an extra $59.99 for it was a valid way to "improve" the game. Simcity too. The graphics on simcity 4000 are SO BUGGY, that I had to hunt around and try multiple point realeases of nvidia video drivers before I wouldnt get crazy random graphics corruption happening in that game. They had some good ideas with the whole multiple cities on a continent theme, but If I cant see it because of graphics bugs then wtf good is it?? This is also on multiple machines with both ATI and NVIDIA cards. You can get it running if you find the exact magic combination of drivers and details/resolutions but come on! EA is a huge company! Maybe thats why they make such shit now, too much beurocracy, not enough risk taking.

I just remembered one last thing I absolutely hate about ea's business practices. Every time I logged into BF2, I would get an ad for some other stupid EA game or bf2 pay for mod. Showing ads to me in a game that I have PURCHASED is crossing the line.

Now thats 4 games, and I didnt actually play the games you mentioned. Seems like alot of people (usually on consoles so what do they know?) forgive them for various UI bugs that I would consider unacceptable in a gold game. I don't play sports games but I have heard them roundly condemed by everyone who does. Fuck EA. They took their slogan too literally and "challenged" good gameplay, exsisting franchises and good quality code. From what I have read about the practices at that company re developers, I am not surprised in the slightest that they produce the most buggy unplayable games I have ever tried to play.