- Aug 24, 2001
- 31,796
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Crackdown is beloved but not necessarily profitable
- Thread starter Queasy
- Start date
They got my $10 (newegg) and I don't even own a 360 yet 
> .part of the reason why you had 1.5 million sales is because of the Halo 3 multiplayer beta tie-in where some gamers got the game to get the beta and then sold it to Gamestop.
... and some who did keep it were only willing to pay $60 because of the halo beta, instead of waiting for a better price like me.
So they owe MS thanks for breaking even, and can't complain too much about used sales.
> .part of the reason why you had 1.5 million sales is because of the Halo 3 multiplayer beta tie-in where some gamers got the game to get the beta and then sold it to Gamestop.
... and some who did keep it were only willing to pay $60 because of the halo beta, instead of waiting for a better price like me.
So they owe MS thanks for breaking even, and can't complain too much about used sales.
mugs
Lifer
- Apr 29, 2003
- 48,920
- 46
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Yeah, complaining about used sales is weak. Every game faces that, but people are willing to buy the best games new for full price. I think Crackdown's real problem was that it was a new IP, which usually don't sell well. I also didn't find the demo very appealing, but when I borrowed the full version from a friend I really got into it. If Crackdown 2 is as good as or better than Crackdown, I think it will do very well.
Also, if you sell 1.5 million copies of a game and just break even, you're doing something wrong. But I think he's saying Realtime Worlds just broke even on the game - I'm sure Microsoft did much better than break even.
Also, if you sell 1.5 million copies of a game and just break even, you're doing something wrong. But I think he's saying Realtime Worlds just broke even on the game - I'm sure Microsoft did much better than break even.
AstroManLuca
Lifer
- Jun 24, 2004
- 15,628
- 5
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Crackdown was fun. I got it from NewEgg for $10 like many people. Well worth it at that price. I wouldn't have paid $60 for it though. Maybe $30.
Thing is, games are so expensive that people are inclined to sell them, either to GameStop or to other gamers, in order to buy more. Much more economical than just picking up every game that looks interesting for $60 and then just keeping it forever until it depreciates to the point where it's not worth selling. If games cost half as much, there'd be more new sales and less motivation to sell them to GameStop or buy them used, but there'd be less revenue too.
The fact of the matter is, the market can sustain a certain level of revenue, regardless of what the prices are. Raising prices on games would increase used sales and decrease new sales, while lowering prices would increase new sales and decrease used sales. It's all about finding the right balance.
Thing is, games are so expensive that people are inclined to sell them, either to GameStop or to other gamers, in order to buy more. Much more economical than just picking up every game that looks interesting for $60 and then just keeping it forever until it depreciates to the point where it's not worth selling. If games cost half as much, there'd be more new sales and less motivation to sell them to GameStop or buy them used, but there'd be less revenue too.
The fact of the matter is, the market can sustain a certain level of revenue, regardless of what the prices are. Raising prices on games would increase used sales and decrease new sales, while lowering prices would increase new sales and decrease used sales. It's all about finding the right balance.
I know the devs didnt get all the money from those sales but thats comes out to 90 million in sales. (assuming all were bought at 60 which we know is wrong but its still in the ballpark). The budget on that game had to be around 45 million (assuming half goes to the dev) which is a ton of money for crackdown imo.
- Aug 24, 2001
- 31,796
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Yeah, he's definitely talking breaking even from the dev standpoint. The profit-margin for developers isn't all that great because you gotta consider that retail and publishers are taking a pretty good chunk of the games sales as well. Also remember that game development cost rose dramatically with this generation of games. Killzone 2 for instance is rumored to have cost $60 million to make. And while Crackdown certainly is no KZ2, I wouldn't be surprised if the development costs were in the $15 to $20 million range.
Yeah if that game sold 1.5 million and he says it broke even he is either full of it or they didn't do a very good job with the development money.
gorcorps
aka Brandon
- Jul 18, 2004
- 30,739
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IMO Crackdown wasn't worth the full $60 anyway. Very solid controls and leveling system but the whole 'kill these people, then the leader, and do it for 3 gangs' thing was very boring. No story, no cutscenes, no voice acting other than the (quite annoying) boss/announcer guy... I have no idea what could have cost them so much to barely break even. It wasn't that good of a game really, just better than people thought for a new series that was toting the Halo 3 beta
sourceninja
Diamond Member
- Mar 8, 2005
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fatpat268
Diamond Member
- Jan 14, 2006
- 5,853
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Yea, I fully agree. I only bought the game for the beta (and I didn't even play that much of the Halo 3 beta, so it was a waste). The game was fun, but not $60 fun. Too much repetition. That said, I would pick it up at $20 if I didn't already beat it already.
Maybe Microsoft charged them for the Halo 3 inclusion?
To be honest, selling a million of anything should be enough to make decent money. If it isn't, rethink the business model or get out of it.
Crackdown is great. I almost bought a second copy Saturday at Gamestop so that I could gift it to my brother.
The majority of those used sales weren't willing to pay full price, so it not as if they would have actually sold them new anyway.
I buy maybe 10-20% of my games new. I simply wont pay $60 for a game that isnt a first day must buy, and a guilt trip by a developer isnt going to change that.
Basically, I have an idea in my head about how much I'm willing to pay for a game. When it gets to that point, I buy it, preferably new, but used is just as good.
I actually recently bought HAWX new. In fact, I've been buying quite a few Ubisoft games new, since they seem to drop in price dramatically over a few months in order to keep up with used game pricing.
mugs
Lifer
- Apr 29, 2003
- 48,920
- 46
- 91
I did too, but I didn't even have a 360 when the Halo 3 beta was going on, nor would I have been interested in the Halo 3 beta because at the time I didn't play console FPSes, and I got Crackdown for ~$30 after it had been out for a while. I really enjoyed the game. It wasn't perfect, but I thought it was really good. It was repetitive in the same way that most games are repetitive - you do the same thing over and over with a different set of challenges. I loved that there were really no constraints on how you accomplished your goals or in what order. All you had to do was find the bosses and kill them.
I didn't care for the driving though; I understand it's better if you level up, but I hated the initial driving so much that I never bothered to level it up.
I got it for the beta of Halo 3, but all in all - I enjoyed Crackdown a lot. The beta made the game a winner...otherwise, it would have been another game that got overlooked by many.
Nope. The demo sold me on the game. I don't even play Halo online other than co-op, so I didn't care one bit about the beta.
If you can't be profitable with a million and a half copies sold, I'm not sure what to say. Maybe most of the sales were at the lower price points? That would lead me to think they should have dropped their retail price a lot faster.
$60 retail
-$15 margin
$45 Wholesale
-$15 Royalties
$30 For all associated costs. This is NOT just development. Distribution, packaging, certification, and advertising(which can be rather huge) all come out of this slice of coin. On a realistic basis, devs would normally expect to get about half of that(publishers the other half), so $15. That would put them at $22.5Million in development costs- and this is all based on them selling at the $60 price point. Wouldn't shock me if the devs cut was closer to ~16$-$18Million with more realistic pricing curves.
Wow is that a stupid thing to say, not like borderline- shockingly moronic. Not saying that you are, but damn was that dumb. Movie tickets? Food products? Razorblades? Operating Systems? Game consoles? Processors? GPUs? Medicine? Vaccines? It would take little effort to come up with a hundred different items that wouldn't come close to breaking even with a million units sold, some of them would lose billions of dollars with one million sold. You think Intel needs to get out of the business they are in? Microsoft? That is exactly what you are saying. The R&D those two put into most of their products would have anything under the tens of millions of units sold as a loss leader. Many people, thankfully, are far brighter then what your comment above demonstrates for the good of the world.
-$15 margin
$45 Wholesale
-$15 Royalties
$30 For all associated costs. This is NOT just development. Distribution, packaging, certification, and advertising(which can be rather huge) all come out of this slice of coin. On a realistic basis, devs would normally expect to get about half of that(publishers the other half), so $15. That would put them at $22.5Million in development costs- and this is all based on them selling at the $60 price point. Wouldn't shock me if the devs cut was closer to ~16$-$18Million with more realistic pricing curves.
Wow is that a stupid thing to say, not like borderline- shockingly moronic. Not saying that you are, but damn was that dumb. Movie tickets? Food products? Razorblades? Operating Systems? Game consoles? Processors? GPUs? Medicine? Vaccines? It would take little effort to come up with a hundred different items that wouldn't come close to breaking even with a million units sold, some of them would lose billions of dollars with one million sold. You think Intel needs to get out of the business they are in? Microsoft? That is exactly what you are saying. The R&D those two put into most of their products would have anything under the tens of millions of units sold as a loss leader. Many people, thankfully, are far brighter then what your comment above demonstrates for the good of the world.
Are those the real figures or just estimates you are using? I honestly don't know what the real costs are? If those numbers are real then most games seem like they would lose money continually unless they were hitting the 2 million + mark. That means most games fail in the current model.
It seems we need to switch to a distribution model on PSN / Xbox live / Steam only to help developers become more profitable. 2nd hand game sale moot and more money to developers. I know this is not popular but the other model seems broken.
Crackdown was one of the first 3 games I bought for my xbox and I loved it.
Wholesale and licensing fees aren't estimates, well, I suppose the licensing may have special exceptions for certain titles(if you are tying to land an exclusive as an example). While that model may seem like it could be an issue, if you limit your marketing push and don't have a very big budget game then 1 million copies can turn you a fairly decent profit. You don't need $20 Million to develop a game today, but if you are talking about a more ambitious title then yes, on a realistic basis you probably need to sell around 2 million copies to make a reasonable profit.
That pales in comparison to how much more money they make due to cross platform revenue. Digital distribution isn't necessarily going to reduce how much the publishers take- they are the ones who put up the cash to get the game made in the first place, they have first grabs at any profits. This is part of the reason we are seeing the indy publisher go away. When Bioware releases a game now, EA is pocketing the entire $30, they aren't then dividing it again so the profits on that same game will be ~doubled for them and look far more attractive to ther bottom line(for no real additional outlay of cash beyond acquisition cost).
That pales in comparison to how much more money they make due to cross platform revenue. Digital distribution isn't necessarily going to reduce how much the publishers take- they are the ones who put up the cash to get the game made in the first place, they have first grabs at any profits. This is part of the reason we are seeing the indy publisher go away. When Bioware releases a game now, EA is pocketing the entire $30, they aren't then dividing it again so the profits on that same game will be ~doubled for them and look far more attractive to ther bottom line(for no real additional outlay of cash beyond acquisition cost).
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