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[Torchkas]

I really don't understand.

[Türbo Bröther]

Because multinationals don't wanna change their way of thinking.

[Schoq]

In 2009, as reported by Forbes magazine, Robert Kotick received approximately $3.2 million USD in salary, benefits, options and incentives for his work with Activision Blizzard, of which $953,654 was his actual salary.[1] By 2013, Kotick was the second highest compensated CEO in the United States, earning $64.9 million USD, mostly in stock.[10]

As Chief Executive Officer at ELECTRONIC ARTS INC., ANDREW WILSON made $19,972,718 in total compensation. Of this total $1,083,846 was received as a salary,

[Cobralad]

because most of game production happens in us and western europe, where cost of living was driven to the limit by big cities housing market and lack of socially available healthcare. And they still move 70% of production to china and eastern europe. So $60 is too low.
So just let all this CalArts bay area stuff die if you dont want $100 games.

[Superb Joe]

probably because they cost absurd amounts of money to make even when subsidised by mentally insane loot box addicts

[Superb Joe]

the following are good to me:

invisible walls
unvoiced dialogue
stratification of cutscenes whereby many of them rely on reused assets and animations with only a select few important to the story that are manually lip synched

if a game isn't visibly straining against every seam of its budget then the budget is probably too big

[ViktorTheBoar]

Most of AAA games cost about 5€ to me. I just buy them about three years after they come out :D

[Raptor85]

I would like to point out too that in the 90's most AAA titles were more on the $80-$90 range, plus the drop in price from $60 to the $30 range happens REALLY FAST for most games now, so the $60 is more of an early adopter fee for most.  Games are cheaper than they've ever been, by a LOT.

[InfiniteStateMachine]

It's one of the few things that hasn't risen in price with inflation (despite the fact AAA cost WAY more to make now than they did in the 90's)

[Schoq]

which shouldn't be surprising at all considering the market is much much (much) larger now and the equation basically doesn't have marginal costs. if anything it's weird they're not sold for less

[sanwayzar]

probably because they cost absurd amounts of money to make even when subsidised by mentally insane loot box addicts

You are the wind beneath my wings.

[InfiniteStateMachine]

which shouldn't be surprising at all considering the market is much much (much) larger now and the equation basically doesn't have marginal costs. if anything it's weird they're not sold for less

The market is larger but I'm not sure the AAA market is larger. AFAIK PS2 still has the most units sold and games were significantly cheaper to make back then. The cost to make a game each generation is growing at an insane pace. Console game companies are being more conservative than ever when greenlighting games because making a AAA game is more of a risk these days.

[Torchkas]

if anything it's weird they're not sold for less

this is what i was getting at. a movie ticket costs like nothing, yet a game costs this. i just don't see why. DVDs can't be that expensive.

[Superb Joe]

if movies could be a success with only a million people watching them then the economics of making and marketing a film would be uh different

[Cobralad]

theres between 40 to 100 million people in the entire world who can afford to pay above $40 for shameful videogame

[NowSayPillow]

probably because they cost absurd amounts of money to make even when subsidized by mentally insane loot box addicts

You are the wind beneath my wings.

<3

[Schoq]

can I also just throw in the thing about how both "AAA" movies and games necessarily have to include things that look unmistakably expensive (not (easily) reproducible by small studios, such as state of the art CG sequences or dumb shit like intricately animated menus and big name actors in games) just to differentiate themselves from producers with less capital even if it really adds squat to the experience and can't otherwise be justified to use your budget on

[joseph ¯\_(ツ)_/¯]

the price is fine, but why have aaa profits tripled but salaries stagnated in the last few years?

[InfiniteStateMachine]

can I also just throw in the thing about how both "AAA" movies and games necessarily have to include things that look unmistakably expensive (not (easily) reproducible by small studios, such as state of the art CG sequences or dumb shit like intricately animated menus and big name actors in games) just to differentiate themselves from producers with less capital even if it really adds squat to the experience and can't otherwise be justified to use your budget on

I agree with that. A lot of unnecessary stuff in AAA games.

the price is fine, but why have aaa profits tripled but salaries stagnated in the last few years?

Can you post a link showing those numbers?

[J-Snake]

The more interesting question is: Why did "AAA" games (as the meaning of "AAA" changes with times) cost 60 bucks before?