The CEO of Sabre Interactive, the developer of Space Marine 2, has said that he believes the era of bloated AAA games with budgets of $200 million to $400 million is ending. He may be onto something, with many huge-budget games like Concord (may it rest in peace), Skull and Bones (may it rot in hell), and Unknown 9 seemingly underperforming. If you are unfamiliar with the latter, it is understandable. This multi-million dollar disaster had books, shows, and more games planned, but upon release, it was met with a peak player count of just 285.
Some estimates suggest that the budget of most AAA games has more than doubled with each new console generation. For example, Marvel’s Spider-Man on the PlayStation 4 cost around $100 million, whereas Spider-Man 2 on the PlayStation 5 cost around $200 million, despite barely any noticeable difference in quality, and the game only costs $10 more.
Matt Karch
Earlier this week, in an interview with Game File on a private jet (for some reason), Matt Karch, the CEO of Saber Interactive, told Game File, “I think that the age of the $200 million, $300 million, $400 million triple-A game is on its way out.”
He also stated that he believes a large part of Space Marine 2’s success can be attributed to its focused, one-and-done campaign, and the fact that it doesn’t burden the single-player portion of the game with unnecessary microtransactions, unlike some games (I’m looking at you, Dragon’s Dogma 2).
I agree. We have seen time and time again that games that maintain a relatively small budget, don’t treat their developers poorly, and focus on the player experience tend to perform the best. Games like Baldur’s Gate 3, which won numerous awards and gained universal praise, stuck to a modest budget of $100 million. A more recent example is Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, which cost around $50 million and recouped all development costs in a single day.
However, GTA 6 is still predicted for released by the end of the year, with estimated costs near $1 billion, and some predict it will usher in a new era of $100 games and microtransactions.
Space Marine 2
Speaking of Space Marine 2, if you haven’t already tried the game, now might be one of the best opportunities, with the release of one of its larger updates, bringing a slew of new features. You can read more about that here.
