Developing in The Industry Today

A typical game in the early to mid nineties would have contained a development team of approximately 5 or 6 people and cost around $300 000 - $800 000 US to develop. Nowadays though, development teams are much larger and usually contain dozens of employees, including specialist artists, 3D modellers, designers, artificial intelligence experts, animators, programmers, musicians and sound engineers to name but a few. Development budgets usually stretch into millions of dollars, with bigger titles such as Square's Final Fantasy VII and Sega's Shenmue costing $26 and $20 million US respectively. Not to mention the costs of publishing and marketing, the latter of which plays a far greater role today than it ever has in the past. Big name titles often have astoundingly large marketing budgets, such as Eidos' Tomb Raider III, which had a global budget of $15 Million US (more than 4 times the game's development costs). While this is the exception rather than the rule, it shows the lengths that publishers will go to in attempting to ensure a game's success in the in the mainstream market. (Source: Games Investor, 2002)

Because there is a high financial risk involved when making video games, developers and publishers will always need to be sure that they have a good chance of making a profit from a game. These chances are greatly increased if a game sticks to a formula that has worked in the past. The first person shooter, the real time strategy game, the racing game, the role playing game (RPG) and the platformer, are all examples of existing genres that have worked well, and sold games in the past. These styles of games have pre-existing fan bases and large markets that will be interested in buying games of genres they enjoy and are familiar with. The concept of "Consumer games" is also worth mentioning in relation to developing profitable games. "Consumer games" are targeted primarily at mainstream audiences, and nearly always consist of simple concepts put together using recycled ideas and formulas. Games Investor says that Consumer games titles are either brand-led (e.g. Who Wants to be a Millionaire, Monopoly), appeal to a radically different demographic (e.g. Barbie, The Spice Girls) or can be easily associated with a popular pastime (e.g. driving, sports). In these cases, creativity and innovation is often withheld in favour of easily recognizable and accessible games for the average consumer. "Quality is less of an issue and will not become a factor for the foreseeable future as the demographic to which they (consumer games) appeal cannot differentiate, and arguably is not interested in differentiating, between high quality and low quality product." (Source: Games Investor, 2002)

Publishers can only afford to publish a certain number of games at any one time, which creates a lot of competition between developers to gain funding and a publishing contract. Unfortunately, a publisher is more likely to take the safe path with a game of a tried and tested genre, that will probably ensure profits, than take a risk with a creative game that breaks set moulds, but may not have any immediate appeal to the mass market, and hence a fair potential for economic failure. While many developers often wish to deviate from the norm when creating games, the constant pressure applied by publishers to make money tends to keep them restricted to the realms of pre set genres.