Remember when you had all the time in the world to spend in front of your TV or computer, playing these incredible games all hours of the day? Well, that’s not much of the case anymore, right? If it is, we envy you. But for most of us now, finding the time to enjoy a new game is tough. Setting aside the time for these games can also become problematic as they can be absolutely massive. One former PlayStation executive suggests we should see developers dial things way back not only for players short on time but also to stop these alarming development costs studios must endure.
Recently, Eurogamer had the chance to speak with former PlayStation executive Shawn Layden. During their conversation, Shawn noted that making some of these games is not suitable anymore. While he was last associated with the PlayStation 4, the former executive noted that each generation of consoles saw double the resources required to develop a game. As a result, you’re looking at new top-tier games costing several hundred million dollars.
We need to address two or three things specifically. One thing is the exploding cost of game development. Every generation it costs twice as much to build a game. What costs $1m on PS1, then costs two, then four, then 16. It goes exponentially. The PS4 generation, which was the last I was associated with, game dev was 150m if you want to be top of the line, and that’s before marketing. So by that math, PS5 games should eventually reach $300m to $400m – and that is just outright not sustainable. – Shawn Layden
What makes it worse is that not only is this a behemoth amount to pour into a game, but it’s a typical project where developers strive to provide players with countless hours of gameplay. That was the metric developers used in the past, as Shawn noted that this was once a selling point. But that was during a time when the average gamer was 18 to 23 years old. Now that we have gamers in their late 20s and 30s, developers must rethink their strategy.
The former executive went on to say that at this age, people have less time to play games. As a result, there are more players who never reach the final level of a game. In that case, all the resources spent to flesh this game out could be considered a waste. As a result, Shawn suggests developers spend less on game development by cutting down the length of time it takes to finish the campaign.
I’ve made a bunch of games that were 80, 90 hours long so I’ll be the first to say those weren’t always 100 percent quality hours. There were a lot of moments in there where I really felt ‘am I running across this same field again?’ I would like to see a world where you can get back to 18 to 23 hours of gameplay, but with gameplay so compelling you don’t want to put the controller down. – Shawn Layden
I know more than a few wouldn’t mind seeing shorter games. After all, when you’re older, have a family, and work full time, getting some time in to play games can be rather brief. That might also make it a little easier for developers to take some risks and provide new game experiences if they are not shelling out a lot of money for development.
