Witcher 3 - Made for $81.000.000

[Myrthos]

Gamespot informs us that the development and marketing of The Witcher 3 has cost $81 million.

CD Projekt Red has announced exactly how much money it spent to make the celebrated open-world role-playing game, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. Speaking during CD Projekt Red's latest financial briefing, the English translation of which was published today, CEO Adam Kicinski revealed the game's total budget--including development and marketing costs--as 306 million złoty or about $81 million USD.

lso during his presentation, Kicinski says CD Projekt Red conducted 40 different marketing campaigns in parallel for The Witcher 3. He described this as a "daunting task," noting that the region-specific marketing campaigns were accompanied by a global campaign, too.

Kicinski also revealed that The Witcher 3 was developed over the course of 3.5 years by a team of professionals that "know how to develop games efficiently." A total of 240 in-house staff worked on The Witcher 3 (most were Polish, but a "considerable" number were foreigners), while 1,500 people in all around the world were involved in the game's production.

Thanks lostforever

More information.

 

[borcanu]

so not worth it )
translate those money into anything you want.
so
not
worth
it

 

[ikbenrichard]

uh economy bubble

 

[you]

I wuold like to know the split between development and marketing.

 

[JDR13]

so not worth it )
translate those money into anything you want.
so
not
worth
it

I'm pretty sure that depends on how many copies they sold.

 

[cptbarkey]

this is useless without profit numbers.

 

[basharran]

I'm pretty sure that depends on how many copies they sold.

True, I also wonder how much they really get from each sold copy. Since they are the developer and publisher that should be better than a "normal" developer wil get?

 

[Toff]

Last info was that they sold 6 million copies. So 81/6 = $13.5 per copy would be break even at that point in time. They made nowhere near $60 per copy but $13.5 sounds very attainable.

Good for them. They made a great game and I hope they make tons. I can't wait to buy their next game.

 

[DarNoor]

An article was posted a couple weeks ago concerning the profit the game made. I thought it was 30 million. Maybe more. I can't remember. The article should be still on here some where.

 

[Ripper]

I suspect a large chunk of this was the marketing. This was the game for which they needed to make the leap into the mainstream AAA conciousness, from their somewhat indie niche. They have probably now achieved a degree of recognition such that their future games will be an easier sell.

 

[Thrasher]

The last article quoting this number said the breakdown was 40 mil for development and 40 mil for marketing.

 

[lostforever]

The last article quoting this number said the breakdown was 40 mil for development and 40 mil for marketing.

I remember reading similar numbers as well.

 

[Dragonx]

This is a very positive numbers for CDPR. Even if they made only $25 per copy sold x 6 mil copies, that is $150 million. That means they made back the initial $81 million cost and profited so far 70 million. Its means that the company can operate with 250 in house developers for 3.5 more years making a new game no one will get fired, and another $70 million to save or invest in new properties or brands for the company. As we all know Witcher 3 will sell easily another 2 million copies and make another $50 million. This is a very good thing for CDPR as this ensures pretty much they can operate their company for next 10 years without layoffs just from the sales of 1 game.

 

[rjshae]

The typical budget for a Hollywood film runs to nine figures. I could see some US$5 billion game budgets happening in the future as the game development business becomes increasingly competitive with the film industry.

 

[Branthog]

Eighty-one dollars is an incredible budget.

 

[Paul]

Jesus F. Christ, the source for this news is a video posted by CDP themselves from investor meeting:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MyMiT4OUy4

All information is there including net profit and their current cash balance. They also released detailed info in text:
https://www.cdprojekt.com/resources...ary_of_Consolidated_Reports_of_CDP_SA_eng.pdf

I really hate this trend of posting news without actual sources which then leads to stupid speculation.

TLDR: Witcher 3 paid for itself on day 1, already made more than 60 million USD in pure profit and continues selling incredibly well, due to its extremely high quality, effective marketing and word of mouth.

 

[johnnysd]

I am waiting for the sale. Seems to me I may need to wait for one of the mega sales.

 

[cptbarkey]

Jesus F. Christ, the source for this news is a video posted by CDP themselves from investor meeting:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MyMiT4OUy4

All information is there including net profit and their current cash balance. They also released detailed info in text:
https://www.cdprojekt.com/resources...ary_of_Consolidated_Reports_of_CDP_SA_eng.pdf

I really hate this trend of posting news without actual sources which then leads to stupid speculation.

TLDR: Witcher 3 paid for itself on day 1, already made more than 60 million USD in pure profit and continues selling incredibly well, due to its extremely high quality, effective marketing and word of mouth.

thanks for sharing, and praise be Jesus H. Christ that i didn't care enough to dig for that info when it should have been presented up front for any kind of informative information.

 

[Damian]

That is quite cheap for an AAA game.

 

[luj1]

Funny thing is, superior games can be made by smaller teams and modest budgets. TW3 is great among the typical modern open world RPG but I prefer something out of the box