Brace yourselves; next-gen games are finally coming. And according to Electronic Arts, they’ll be 5-10% more expensive to produce. As Joystiq reports, EA CFO Blake Jorgensen addressed the subject of PlayStation 4 game development costs during the company’s recent investor conference call.
Jorgensen stated that, "on any one title, it might be five to 10 percent increases in cost, but the real opportunity comes with the ability to expand what you can do in that title." He added that EA also expects to see "larger revenue streams" because of "the excitement around some of those big titles."
Considering the performance delta between current-gen consoles and the PS4, I actually expected the cost increase to be larger. Next-gen consoles should enable much more lifelike characters, not to mention bigger, richer environments—and all of those extra assets take additional manpower to create. Still, if game studios can take full advantage of next-gen platforms (and current-gen PCs) while keeping costs from spiraling out of control, I’m all for it.
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