Ubisoft CEO Says Next Gen Consoles Closer Than We Think [Slashdot]

[DP ServBot]

An anonymous reader writes "Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot tells CNBC that he believes the next generation of video game systems isn't as far away as the public has been led to believe. Guillemot noted that public demand for the best machine possible, as well as coming competition from companies such as OnLive could spur Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo to roll out new systems sooner than they want. That's not good news for publishers, though, as he says games in the next generation will likely cost $60 million to create."
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[Poofta!]

a hundred... milllion... dollars!

[j_factor]

Even if a new console comes out next year, I highly doubt competition from OnLive will have anything to do with it.

[heybtbm]

New consoles? . People are going to buy these things with what money? I think I'll save mine for "The 2010 Depression". Soup lines FTW!

[Poofta!]

New consoles? . People are going to buy these things with what money? I think I'll save mine for "The 2010 Depression". Soup lines FTW!

with internet monies.

[Clownzilla]

Why do games have to be $60+ Million to make? I understand that certain blockbusters can easily cost that much but money is not a requirement for a quality game that the market is attracted to. I know saying that is beating a dead horse but the industry is losing it's appeal because of this mentality.

[Rob2600]

Why do games have to be $60+ Million to make? I understand that certain blockbusters can easily cost that much but money is not a requirement for a quality game that the market is attracted to. I know saying that is beating a dead horse but the industry is losing it's appeal because of this mentality.

I agree. How much did World of Goo cost to develop? Mega Man 9? Developers don't *need* $60 million to make a fun, highly-rated, popular video game.

[Rickstilwell1]

New consoles? . People are going to buy these things with what money? I think I'll save mine for "The 2010 Depression". Soup lines FTW!

@ The Soup Line...

Can I have some more?

MORE!!!!!!?????

Hey remember the song Ten in 2010 by Bad Religion? it says "Ten billion people all suffering" Anyone who has played Crazy Taxi 1 has probably heard the song.

No really, the economy doesn't affect my grocery store job as everyone in my town needs food no matter what so I'd be first in line to buy a new system by any company who puts it out. The current gen has been setting on my shelves for a while now...

[Ed Oscuro]

$60mil are you shittin' me

and they won't be longer or deeper than current gen ones, lol

they might have more destructible geometry and be about as powerful as my new PC though, woohoo!

[crom]

everytime I play a game like gears of war or mass effect i ask my self "how much better would these games be if they had more room on the disc's?"

also, 5 years imo is a good cycle, hear me out...

you upgrade your computer dont you? well, if you play games you do...

10 years is a long time, in the span of ten years nes went to snes which went to n64 and within the 11 years to gamecube...

it sucks to dish out money, but hey, this isnt something new, shit I payed $95 for street fighter 2 on snes back in like 93, lol

[unwinddesign]

everytime I play a game like gears of war or mass effect i ask my self "how much better would these games be if they had more room on the disc's?"

also, 5 years imo is a good cycle, hear me out...

you upgrade your computer dont you? well, if you play games you do...

10 years is a long time, in the span of ten years nes went to snes which went to n64 and within the 11 years to gamecube...

it sucks to dish out money, but hey, this isnt something new, shit I payed $95 for street fighter 2 on snes back in like 93, lol

I think the difference is that there aren't really any dividends for gamers or developers with the new hardware. Graphics are sick now anyway. I don't need to see Marcus Fenix's arm hairs to make Gears of War 3 enjoyable.
A great example of a good leap was the Dreamcast. Sonic Adventure? One of the first examples of the power of 3D gaming. Sure, Mario 64 was impressive, but SA was one of the first games where people realized where this type of shit could go. Soul Calibur, too.

I'm sure there are things that the next-gen can bring that will open up games more, but for every 1 good, innovative, technologically demanding game that makes use of the horsepower beyond the omgz wtfz look at the bloom lighting, there will be 100 more that cost way too much money to make, lose the developer money, be expensive, and play EXACTLY like what I can already get on my Xbox 360. Ubi Soft is a key example of this, of course. Assassin's Creed and its sequel, while good games, had ridiculously high costs based on their graphics. There's 450 people working on the second game. The first game was huge, but it had jack shit to do, unless you wanted to run around the towers collecting flags. That's fucking dumb. The actual game was like 7 hours long, and, if they scaled back the graphics/size of the world, really could have been done on the Xbox. Just have all 21 missions or whatever in the same city. Don't really lose much enjoyment, because 95% of the pretty landscape SERVED NO PURPOSE.

Bottom line is that the hardware is still doing amazing things. Yeah, better anti-aliasing, 1080p across the board etc. would be nice, but WAIT until it's fucking cheaper. As it is, we're going to be stuck with another bunch of systems with shitty launch games, shortages and ridiculous prices. Fuck that. Give me a showpiece -- NOT Halo 4 or GTA VI, but some new IP, or a complete redoing of an older IP -- and then launch. Don't force me to upgrade by putting the newest game on the system at launch or some other crap (and yes, as a business major, I'm fully aware that's a good business move.).

I do know one thing. The industry can't afford 60 million dollar games right now. I'll buy a new Xbox day one, without question, regardless if it launched tomorrow or in five years. I just don't think it's necessary, or even healthy for the industry to push forward so soon.

[Gameguy]

New consoles? . People are going to buy these things with what money? I think I'll save mine for "The 2010 Depression". Soup lines FTW!

I'm guessing they'll be using stolen credit cards.

everytime I play a game like gears of war or mass effect i ask my self "how much better would these games be if they had more room on the disc's?"

also, 5 years imo is a good cycle, hear me out...

you upgrade your computer dont you? well, if you play games you do...

10 years is a long time, in the span of ten years nes went to snes which went to n64 and within the 11 years to gamecube...

it sucks to dish out money, but hey, this isnt something new, shit I payed $95 for street fighter 2 on snes back in like 93, lol

I don't upgrade my computer unless I really need to, my current PC is about 9 years old and was upgraded to Win XP around 4 years ago because some software I needed to use required it(I just got the internet at the time and needed a more current PC with an Ethernet port to use it, and at the time I got Norton which needed XP). My previous PC was Win 95, and I still have it and use it occasionally.

This is why tons of people are in debt, they just live beyond their means and keep buying crap they don't need just to have the latest thing which is just slightly improved over what they already had.

Why do games have to be $60+ Million to make? I understand that certain blockbusters can easily cost that much but money is not a requirement for a quality game that the market is attracted to. I know saying that is beating a dead horse but the industry is losing it's appeal because of this mentality.

How much of that cost is salaries? And how much goes to anti-piracy stuff? Does that include licensing costs if some developers make a game based on a movie?

[Iron Draggon]

well I fell for the ruse that Vista was gonna revolutionize PC gaming, and XP just wasn't gonna cut it anymore... I spent about $1000 on upgrades, just so I could run Vista and all those revolutionary Vista-only games, and now I've downgraded to XP and I'm gonna sell my full version Vista disc before the elusive Windows 7 comes out, while I can still get most of my money back on it... all because as it turned out, Vista broke far more of the games I already owned before MS or anyone else made a single Vista-only game that I cared about... so all that money on upgrades just made everything run better on XP, and I'm not in any hurry to upgrade to Windows 7 either... it's basically just an upgrade of Vista, so I'm sure all my games that were broken by Vista will remain broken in Windows 7... all of which means that I'll just stick with XP, and when there are no more new XP games coming out, then I'll be done with PC gaming... but I suspect that will be well after the next generation of consoles comes out, and prolly well after the two generations after that too... at this point it looks like XP may never die out, as it will remain the only Windows OS worth having... everything else will just wish it was XP

[Clownzilla]

How much of that cost is salaries? And how much goes to anti-piracy stuff? Does that include licensing costs if some developers make a game based on a movie?

I'm not sure how much game programmers make but I'm sure that the standard game programmer doesn't get near 100K even after benefits. Sure, the lead programmers and valuable programming specialists will make 100K+ after benefits but the majority of the team will be your average programming employee. Will a standard programming team even reach $2 million in salaries and benefits? As anti-piracy goes, that's just an extra feature tacked on to the disc or DLC system. That cost should only have a nominal effect on development cost. I'm not sure about licensing for movies but it's probably on a per unit royalty basis. There's still a TON of money unnecessarily going to game development (not counting the few exceptions).

[udisi]

I believe advertising makes up a good chunk of the development cost nowadays. Also when you consider it takes most developers years to actually complete a game anymore, the cost of salaries and general overhead over time can be a killer.

[guitargary75]

New consoles? . People are going to buy these things with what money? I think I'll save mine for "The 2010 Depression". Soup lines FTW!

Good point. There is a massive depression on the horizon. This is the last thing people are worried about spending their money on! I see classic games selling better than the new crap.

[ProgrammingAce]

The top 3 costs in game development are Salary, Engine License, and Console License.

Look at a "small" studio like Epic. Not only do they have programmers, but managers, HR, Sales people, executives, secretaries, interns. In total, about 150 people.

Take an average salary (I'm just guessing here) of about $50,000. Multiply that by 150 employees. Multiply that by a 3 year development cycle. You're looking at $22,500,000 in salary for a single game. Even if you cut the work force in half, you're still over 10 million dollars.

[crom]

I dont buy this "games cost alot of money for companies" crap

of course they do!, however video games sell more then dvds and music combined!

matter of fact video games are the biggest media in the world, if you want a piece of that video game money you got to spend money...

all of these smaller companies who want to push out crap are going to learn that they need to spend money, get good programmers and etc, give yourself enough time to make the game, even if it cost more money!...