(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); M2 Research looks into the ups and downs of the games industry for the year.

Interactive entertainment media industry analyst Wanda Meloni is joining the 2009 financial weigh-in party. In her breakdown of the ups and downs of the year, she sheds some light on just how expensive it is to make games.

For previous console generations, she says, the cost of development has been between $3 - 5 million per platform. Nowadays, however, she estimates that the average cost of making one game for one platform is $10 million while multiplatform releases clock in at $18 - $28 million.
Here's how much it cost to make a video game in 2009

Developing games for Facebook, the iPhone and other social media or mobile gaming platforms is far cheaper thanks to lower production costs. Meloni puts the cost of developing social media/casual games at $30 - $300 thousand on a six month development cycle and mobile/iPhone games at $5 - $20 thousand with four months of development.

Meloni estimates that in 2010, more developers will be experimenting with tools to streamline development, switch up distribution models and ways to include microtransactions. The key word, she says, is ROI -- "return on investment."

Nothing compared to the $$$ they make in sales.

wooooooooooooooow lol

typical profit on a physical item is about 25-35%. So you figure the cost of a MW2 disc:

$60 retail
retailer purchase from Activision at aprox $40 a disc making $18 profit
Activision makes aprox $12.5 per disc. The rest of the $60 ($29.50) is te cost of production, marketing and writing the content for the game.

This of course is going to fluccuate signficantly based on the quantity the retailer is buying and the production costs might be off a bit. This is just a fair estimate of what the break down is.

If you're interested in finding more out on the sales and profits of a company... check out the 10k statement for ATVI (Activision). they're a US public company so the info is available for you to read.

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ROI is a major part of business. Actually its the most important part. Where is the link for this info you posted?

iPhone games may be alot cheaper, but theres a HUGE difference between MW2 and Tower Defense Lite. lol

this just proves that the game companies could throw us a free map pack every once in a while.

You know why it costs so much to make a video game? because people working for that company charge other people to use their logos and shit. I know i dont make sense right now but what im trying to say is the developers get paid so much and that all goes into the cost of the game

Rockstar spent around $100million making GTA IV, thats ridiculous since the game was a dissapointment to quite a lot of GTA fans

The retailer won't make that much. They will be lucky at making a few $/£ of the game. They get the money on the trade ins. Thats where game shops make their money, but as for supermarkets they will get the few £/$ or increase the price a little bit. The quantities they sell might make them about a hundred profit from one store, that adding to the other hundreds of shops they own around the country equaling a good few tens of thousands maybe from one game.

Thats not true. Gamestop may make more profit on trade in however typically a company doesn't touch a product (like MW2) unless they're going to make at least 30% profit. It is true that retailers have loss leaders to get you into the stores... those products are those such as the "5 at this price" items.

Check a companies 10k. Look at ATVI 10k for the last few years and you'll see what it costs ATVI to make the game.