343 Industries‘ senior community manager has listed some of the struggles of making modern games in a recent Twitter post.
The tweet by John Junyszek, which comes as a response to a post by Forge Labs’ Sean, answers the question of “Why is it harder to make games these days?” with an image including a list of reasons, along with a TLDR (too long didn’t read) brief explanation that reads, “the expectations and legal requirements for games has increased.”
The list is broken down into nine key points, including the large amount of effort that needs to go into visuals, online play, all of the platforms that need to be supported, laws and regulations, and more. Most of the points are further elaborated on, giving a more specific insight into the creative process.
"Why is it harder to make games these days?"
TL;DR: The expectations and legal requirements for games has increased.A helpful list of examples below: https://t.co/5y9WXVhMe0 pic.twitter.com/sCdrFYxtmX
— John Junyszek (@Unyshek) August 11, 2022
Junyszek continues to state that “each one of those bullets alone is a massive leap from previous generations to modern games. And, many games are expected to do all of this (and more) at the same time.” He continues to explain that each point is “just starting to scratch the surface”, but clarifies that he hopes it’s helpful for anyone curious.
Outside of 343 Industries, we’ve seen a clear example of these higher demands starting to become more of a strain on game creation with Sony’s heightened prices for its first-party PlayStation titles following the launch of the PlayStation 5.
Additionally, former PlayStation executive Shawn Layden shared his belief that the current Triple-A model is “unsustainable” with budgets for the biggest games commonly landing somewhere between $80million (roughly £65.8million) and $150million (around £125.5million) last generation. With Junyszek’s examples, we get a clearer and simpler insight into why ballooning budgets are the case.
In other news, Nintendo won’t be increasing the price of the Nintendo Switch despite the rise in manufacturing costs.