Next-gen dev costs to skyrocket

The managing director of Bandai, Shin Onozawa, has said that development costs for next-gen consoles will soar way above the costs for current generation software titles.

Speaking at the Tokyo Games Show, Onozawa told US news site Bloomberg that the investment needed to develop a title on Xbox 360 and PS3 could skyrocket to 1 billion Yen (7.3 million Euro). At present, he said, development costs tend to range between 100 million yen (738,000 Euro) and 500 million Yen (3.6 million Euro).

But according to a recent survey by the Computer Entertainment Supplier's Association, Onozawa's estimates are too high and average development costs across most platforms are substantially less than 100 million Yen.

The survey, which was based on figures voluntarily supplied by publishers, found that it costs an average of 96 million Yen (708,000 Euro) to develop a PS2 title, and 90 million Yen (660,000 Euro) for Gamecube. The 13 Xbox titles in the survey, however, had an average cost of 202 million Yen (1.5 million Euro).

Onozawa also claimed that Bandai's forthcoming merger with Namco will cut development costs by around 20 per cent. He told Bloomberg: "Costs will begin to fall a year or so after the consoles are released and game makers get used to the systems."