Today we've got a super interesting best of 7 Most Expensive Games Ever Made/Developed with Highest Production Cost list 2022. Games that have spent the most money in their production and the truth is we've had quite a few surprises putting this list together.
Most Expensive Games Ever Made/Developed
Okay so first some ground rules the games that have made it onto the list are here because we know the cost from the company's financial records.
All of the costs are initial costs not over time through dlcs and so on. if there's a game that you think costs more then you're probably right but we're gonna stick with the ones that we have solid numbers for so.
games like the last of us part two aren't on the list because there's nothing official in terms of the numbers or Minecraft because we know that the current investment is more than 200 million.
but that's over time and not the initial cost of production. so boring bit out of the way and now time for the seven games with the highest cost of production in history.
SHADOW OF THE TOMB RIDER - $135 M
The first most expensive games ever developed is Our adolescent platonic love lara croft. This game spent 135 million dollars in its production more precisely creating the game cost 100 million dollars to edius montreal and 35 million was invested into the promotion of the game.
A great figure for a game that in its first year sold more than 4 million copies.
I think it's fair to say it wasn't the success that they wanted it to be but still they said they were super happy.
FINAL FANTASY VII - $145 M
Here we're not talking about the recent remake but about the original game released in 1997.
You may wonder how did the game from that year have such high costs if it's so different in terms of graphics from anything we see today.
Well square had to spend 45 million dollars for the development and 100 million dollars just for marketing.
Without a doubt one of the biggest campaigns in terms of budget in the history of video games. Really, Most Expensive Games Ever Made.
But square needed the whole world to see how wonderful the game they've created that's why to this day there are still so many who consider this to be the best final fantasy in history.
What do you think do you prefer this one or do you prefer the remake.
STAR WARS: THE OLD REPUBLIC - $200 M
When it was released in 2011 star was the old republic could say that it was the most expensive video game ever produced.
Bioware had to put 200 million into the production of the game and had more than 800 people working on it for six years.
In addition they also had to hire about 1 000 voice actors to record lines who would then give life to almost 4 000 characters in game.
Something that surely increased the budget. To this day many of us consider this the best game the franchise has
ever made and we'll be hoping for something very similar in the near future.
CALL OF DUTY: MODERN WARFARE - $250 M
One of the biggest franchises in gaming has one of the most expensive games to develop. Modern warfare 2 is the game that literally cost activision the most.
A lot of gamers even started their call of duty relationship with this version of the game and that is to be expected. Seeing as activision spent about 200 million in marketing and only 50 million in production and development costs.
Its multiplayer was one of the best in memory and even with the controversy it had around the mission no russian in which you had to kill civilians in a russian airport.
It still caused sales to skyrocket and just on the first weekend alone the game sold 4 million units.
GRAND THEFT AUTO V - $265 M
There is literally no Most Expensive Games Ever Made list that we can make that does not include grand theft auto 5. it is the omnipresent god of video games.
In this case rockstar had to spend about 265 million to work on the lives and missions of franklin trevor and michael.
But the people of rockstar did not suffer for spending that money because on the first day alone yes on its first day the game generated 800 million dollars in sales.
And hours later it became the fastest video game in history to generate 1 billion dollars, ll this without counting the multiplayer mode that continues to this day and is already 7 years old.
In 2018 it was announced that the game already had sold 90 million copies and then more than 6 billion.
So that is roughly a profit of 25 times higher than the initial cost of development which places grand theft auto 5 as the most profitable entertainment product in history.
DESTINY - $500 M
Now we start with the really crazy stuff and the first is that the production of destiny cost 140 million dollars and 360 million more went directly to marketing and promotion.
How on earth can you spend up to 500 million dollars in the production of the game. to make it Most Expensive Games Ever Made.
When put into perspective high budget hollywood movies such as avengers end game cost 365 million dollars to produce.
During the first five days the game generated 325 million dollars and over the years it certainly recovered that investment and earned way more. so i don't think we need to worry about them.
HALO INFINITE - $500 M
The next installment of the well-known saga has a budget of 500 million dollars 343 industries is betting hard on its next great game.
And not for nothing it's undoubtedly the flagship game of xbox and so many people are dying to play it. that investment 500 million will be tiny when the game sees the light of day and all the fans buy it.
But we have to say i mean 500 million of budget for this. However the game is one of the most anticipated games ever and it seems that it will be coming to our next gen consoles in 2021 who wants to control the new master chief.
RED DEAD REDEMPTION 2 - $500-$900 M
Trying to get an insight into red dead redemption 2 is a fool's errand it's difficult to give an exact figure on the budget of this ambitious game and that's just because it was developed by multiple studios throughout the world and had more than 3,000 people working on it.
At least that's what we see in the credits of the game regardless of all the salaries that they had to pay it was definitely money well spent.
Because the game generated 725 million dollars just in the first weekend.
how amazing is it for rockstar games to know that even though they need to invest a lot of money into a game.
They'll probably earn it back in less than a week adventures in the american wild west have never generated so many millions.
FINAL WORDS
That's all Most Expensive Games Ever Made but tell us what do you think of these budgets does the video game industry seem to be losing its mind with these high production costs.
Will the bubble burst soon let us know how many of these games you've played throughout your gaming life and which one you like the most.