Gran Turismo 5

[JP]

Not actually played it due to not really being interested in bikes. You say it's flawed but was it any good? Yamauchi was asked whether bikes would be included in GT5 late last year. and he said that if that's what users really want in the game, I think that's a possibility.

I can't imagine it'll be included in this game but he's so slow with releasing information I wouldn't like to rule it out and he has said in the past that he wanted GT to be about all types of racing so I suppose there's a slight chance.

I bet Sony regret letting their exclusive F1 license go now as it would have been another great licensed championship to go along with the WRC, Super GT, Indy Car & NASCAR licensed championships. I think it was just too expensive for a license that they've only released one game for three years ago.

[Malc]

Worldwide sales from February 2010. Both games were no where near the price of a full PS3 retail title.
Would hate to imagine what GT5s development costs are upto now.

Gran Turismo 5: Prologue= 4,650,000

Exactly, just over 4.5 million sales for prologue alone has recouped the cost of GT5's development.

Like I said earlier, the profit side of the series is not what Sony or Polyphony are concerned about at all.

[Phar]

@ John, Yeah it was good, a few of the tracks and the ease of getting the best bikes fairly early on are what lets it down a bit, it's a decent game for a first effort though and I still play it on occassion. It did get reviews mostly around the 7-8 marks so most of the gaming press seemed to like it as well.

[Flabio]

Exactly, just over 4.5 million sales for prologue alone has recouped the cost of GT5's development.

4.5 million sales equals $60 million? What did prologue retail at? And how much of that went back into Polyphony rather than into Sony coffers?

I still don't think the numbers add up.

[JP]

They've certainly sold a fair few of them but I'm wondering what those figures are based on. Does it factor in that both were available to download too and does it also factor in all the free copies of GT-PSP that were given to PSP Go owners?

I'm not sure if they'd make that much of a difference either way though.

I'm not really sure if sales of GT5 will be what they've been in the past though. Are still people buying driving games like they used to now? Surely it's only going to be things such as Modern Warfare & Halo which are guaranteed to sell that well.

I wonder if it's a console seller like the PS1 & PS2 versions were?

[Malc]

4.5 million sales equals $60 million? What did prologue retail at? And how much of that went back into Polyphony rather than into Sony coffers?

I still don't think the numbers add up.

I know the download version originally cost $40, and we know GT5's development cost in dollars as well, so let's take the original retail price alone: 40*4.5000000=180,000,000.

They would have gotten around 180 million (obviously that figure is not exact due to different pricing in each region, and the $10 price drop since release) but there's more than enough money from the sales of prologue to cover GT5's development, with a lot spare to go wherever they needed it.

[Flabio]

So, you're assuming that all of the $40 went to SCE, and all of that was used to fund GT5? There's still a 'retailers cut', even with digital downloads.

[Malc]

No, I'm saying that there's a large enough range from 180mil max to the 60mil dev cost, that Sony would easily make up the cost of GT5's development.

Even half the price at $20 dollars, Sony would still be seeing $30 million in excess of what they paid out to make GT5 so far.

[Flabio]

That would require them to be putting a third of the *retail* price into the dev of the game. And in my experience, that's a far larger figure than the norm. It's usually less than 10%.

[Malc]

That would require them to be putting a third of the *retail* price into the dev of the game. And in my experience, that's a far larger figure than the norm. It's usually less than 10%.

Who knows, the way Sony treat Polyphony with all this extra time, development costs, fancy offices etc. you may be suprised by how well Sony treat Polyphony/make exceptions for them.

[JP]

Polyphony Digital are merely a SCE studio rather than an idependant body and their profits and costs are Sony's profits and costs.

They will of course be monitored individually as would happen in any company with several departments but surely what happens is they are told what game to produce and would be told when a release is expected and what their budget is.

I could be wrong but I don't really see the studio being any more than a bullet point on Sony's finacial reports each year.

[JP]

They've released a direct feed version of the trailer in God of War 3 and crazily good screen captures from the night racing.

[Number45]

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/gt5-gets-three-nurburgring-courses

He just can't stop adding stuff.

[Flabio]

Hehe. I imagine someone at Sony must be getting annoyed by now...

[Colin]

I hate it when this thread pops up, i'm always hoping it's a confirmed release date.