PlayStation 5 Games Will Be More Expensive To Produce, Says Sony

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This Thursday, we’ll finally get to see some of the games Sony has lined up to release on its PlayStation 5 console. However, with the focus likely to be squarely on those games, other aspects about the PlayStation 5, such as its appearance and price, will remain a mystery for a bit longer. In an interview with GamesIndustry.biz, PlayStation CEO Jim Ryan talked about some aspects surrounding the console. And according to him, development costs for PlayStation 5 games are likely to rise in the next generation. ‘I think, to the extent that the technology enables the graphics side of it to become more interesting and life-like, [the games] will become slightly more human intensive and capital intensive to produce. So yes, we think there probably will be an increase in development budgets. ‘We don’t see it as being a massive increase, and that’s why we want to do more faster than we have ever done before, to provide a fertile install base for people who make games to be able to monetise against. If we can keep pace with a likely increase in development costs, then the industry can continue to prosper.’

Last month’s Unreal Engine 5 demo certainly demonstrated how much closer games can get to displaying realism and it’s not surprising to learn that such a feat likely cost quite a bit. This may also have a knock-on effect on consumer prices, although price tags for full price games have changed little over the years, even as the cost of development continues to rise. The other obvious trends of recent generations is that fewer and fewer games get released each year, as new titles not only cost more money to make but more time. That’s also likely to continue in the next generation, despite release schedules becoming increasingly sparse already.