So did I. You see, his name and avatar were shown just to the right of the thread title ;-p

Definitely. And yet, if you quote this common-sense fact on most gaming forums today, you'll get downvoted to hell and back with the fallacy that "games cost that much to make, period".

This pretty much demonstrates the sheer ridiculousness not only of game budgets today but also the media and gaming community response.

How the fuck can $150,000 on one character be justified? I can understand audio costing $5,000, but QA costing $20,000? Animation $30,000? What is being done in 1st party cert for it to be actually worth $10,000? And if audio, animation, and QA are being outsourced, what are the $48,000 for staff being spent on, except design and balancing? And if the argument is that developers, animators and designers cost that much, then why are we constantly being informed that developers and designers earn very little?

Literally, too many people wanting a slice of the pie.

To add my voice to the notion already mentioned here: it isn't outsourcing development or even bad games, it is ballooning budgets supported by unrealistic game sales projections. Capcom and Squeenix are hardly alone in this, but apparently have been the worst offenders and are misallocating blame for their failures.

Well to be fair to that one figure, spread over 8 people, that's $6,000 dollars for a 10 week period which equates to what would be a yearly salary of ~$31,200 a year per person if it were a yearly salary.

However, viewed from the perspective that it is only designing one character in that period of time, I can understand that it still seems like a lot for what shouldn't be as much work. My guess is that particular dev team is trying to support themselves while they look work/bigger project to get funded. If people are willing to pay for that, well ... that's their money. But I would say it is probably a little different than the average reason of why budgets are ballooning (although the reason why the original game failed or "failed" depending on units sold, may be a reasonable example depending on the circumstances given that it was lauded and seemingly successful and they still lost their jobs).

Indeed, but what are these eight people doing? They're not doing audio, that's been outsourced. They're not doing graphics, that's been outsourced as well, as has (the massively overpriced) QA. They're not even handling collision detection in-house.

Eight people all designing and balancing one character?

I understand that the pricing of cert is out of the hands of the devs and that they have to go through it if they want to release on the consoles, but it's still excessive for what it is and still a contributing factor to the problem.

I knew Roman5 has made this thread even before averting my eyes slightly to the right to see whether Roman5 has made this thread!

I knew Roman5 was going to make a thread like this before I opened the forum

Oh god, what have I started?

Run, run before the blast wave hits!

Sure, as I said, for one character I can see why one would argue that it seems like a lot to have 8 people drawing a salary. But since the article stated that they had all been fired (orig studio went under?), I'm guessing that they're using this as a way to float their team until a larger project comes along. :/ Which I feel is a touch different from AAA budgets exploding due to mismanagement and unrealistic expectations, both technical and financial. I understand what you're saying - having overly large teams to develop a game is part of the problem. Agreed. In this case, though I think the overly large team is them trying keep afloat after being let go. However, given the circumstances around them being let go, the "failure" of the base game to keep their studio alive may have been due to those same mismanagements discussed above.

I knew Roman5 would make this thread even before he was born. It was a prophecy.

Regarding the new DmC, I do have a few issues with it. Some of them are Capcom's fault, some of them are not, I doubt Capcom has learnt about what I think are they faults. Anyway, to DmC. There are 2 main issues I have with the game: concept/design, and actual gameplay.

The new Dante sucks and all that? If you ask me, he does suck a bit, but that's just my opinion. My real issue is abandoning the old Dante, not creating a new one. I liked the old Dante, I wanted him to have a decent story. He did not. They messed with the story over and over, and I trusted Capcom to come up with some sort of decent storyline that made it all have sense. Like they did with the Resident Evil of old, you know? But instead of trying to make sense of the universe they created, they just abandoned it. Dante was a really cool character, and they were unable to make a half-decent story around it. That, and not the new reboot, I have a big issue with. Is that how they treat their IP now? How am I supposed to invest myself on any new IP of theirs if I know they don't give a flying fuck about them? Well, that's if they actually had any, of course.

Gameplay wise, there are several things that irk me, but all in all it was a decent game. And it had a decent port to PC, which I could play without controller no less! Granted, nowhere as well as with a controller, but I still managed pretty well with keyboard and mouse and I could see myself mastering those controls if I actually spent some time getting used to it. So this is a game I bought, because I was starving for a decent game on this genre on PC. But when I compare it to previous DmC titles? Well, it goes down.

- It's easy. And don't give me that crap about the higher difficulty settings, I've beaten it on Dante Must Die (which is extremely annoying as you have to beat the game again and again to unlock) and it was still easy. Sure, they were harder than normal difficulty, but while DMC3's Dante Must Die mode had enemies that would rip me to shreds in seconds if I wasn't 100% on the game, I beat DmC's without even trying particularly hard. I no longer have time to make an effort in training myself to beat the game on hardest setting, but I miss the chance of doing it. And don't get me started on the rankings. I die 8 times on a mission and I get an S ranking? WTF??

- Weapon restrictions are dumb. So, you put demonic weapons as heavy, slow types and angelic weapons as fast hitting spammers. Great. Being able to switch fast among them? great. And then you throw me a heavy enemy with a shield that I can only hurt with angelic weapons. Who thought that was a good idea? Not to mention the canceling effect when you use a weapon you shouldn't be using, which not only leaves you vulnerable but breask the flow of the fight. I hated that.

- Devil trigger. It's boring. In previous DMC titles, using the DT turned you into a absolute badass killing machine by boosting your speed, power and even regenerating you. It was extremely satisfying to cut through enemies while it lasted, and unlocking the unlimited DT (usually by beating Dante Must Die) was SO MUCH FUN. The new DT launches enemies into the air leaving them helpless, limiting the combos you can use to air only and limiting you to deal as much damage as you can while it lasts. It's boring. Very boring. BORING. If that's what you're going to do, why not make everyone on screen die and get it over with? And the unlimited DT gameplay is not only boring but also annoying with the lost sight perception. Bah.

I think this about sums my issues with that game. Sure I miss styles, and I liked the gameplay of DMC4 (even if other areas of the game were not as good). But those came after.

From what I have read, they now want to make MORE DLCs. In-house DLCs. So they learned a fucking nothing I may say....

Sure thats possible and has done before.

Rather i meant, that i challenge anyone to genuinely tell me there has been situation, that there havent been any (new) games to play.

Sure there are bunch of console games id like to play on pc for example, but in no way i could claim that we are running out of games :)

In the old-old days there were times, when me and my friends had played like 90% games that i was possible to get hold in anyways possible - but these days....never ever has there been as many good games we have today. Sure they are different kind of games than the games of 80's or 90's for example - but lots of good stuff. For cheap too thanks to digital distribution.