there is no way any of those companies are actually making money if you strip away all their accounting and financial hijinks

(https://xoxohth.com/thread.php?thread_id=5875481&forum_id=2#49947916)

The Xbox devs... Who knows, bc it’s such a large company and they take up so much time and effort bc they fail constantly plus Cloud Infrastructure

(https://xoxohth.com/thread.php?thread_id=5875481&forum_id=2#49948084)

The old industry made Games. The new industry makes strategic content vessels. Huge Teams. Huge Budgets.

Hugh Prices. No shipping discipline. No taste. No shame. And then the thing launches at 62 on Metacritic, gets a “mixed” Steam rating, misses internal expectations, is patched for six months by shell-shocked Engineers, gets a “we hear you” roadmap, then the studio is closed by a man using the word “reprioritize," that is the business now and gaming revenue is gigantic which is the fake comfort and the corpse is in the premium AAA model.

Huge Teams. Huge Budgets. Hugh Prices. Huge Losses. And the Losses have only grown Huger. Losses back in the day weren't nearly as catastrophic imo:

2009–2015: The old failure regime

Bionic Commando — Revenue: $18M | Budget: $45M | Loss: $27M | Capcom reboot nobody needed; a mechanical arm wrapped around an invoice.

Wanted: Weapons of Fate — Revenue: $12M | Budget: $25M | Loss: $13M | Licensed game; licensed death.

Terminator Salvation — Revenue: $14M | Budget: $30M | Loss: $16M | The machines won because the humans shipped this.

Brütal Legend — Revenue: $35M | Budget: $55M | Loss: $20M | Cult object, commercial bruise, too weird for the mall and too expensive for the basement.

The Saboteur — Revenue: $22M | Budget: $45M | Loss: $23M | Interesting, doomed, and wearing Pandemic’s funeral suit.

Dark Void — Revenue: $15M | Budget: $40M | Loss: $25M | Jetpack into shareholder value.

APB: All Points Bulletin — Revenue: $20M | Budget: $100M | Loss: $80M | MMO hubris before “metaverse” gave cowards a new spell.

Alpha Protocol — Revenue: $18M | Budget: $35M | Loss: $17M | Brilliant mess; the kind of failure AAA can no longer afford to make.

Blur — Revenue: $25M | Budget: $45M | Loss: $20M | Bizarre Creations made a good game and the market shrugged like a bailiff.

Singularity — Revenue: $28M | Budget: $50M | Loss: $22M | Activision buried it quietly behind the barn.

Bodycount — Revenue: $8M | Budget: $35M | Loss: $27M | A shooter called Bodycount; the title became internal accounting.

Homefront — Revenue: $70M | Budget: $95M | Loss: $25M | Sold, but not enough; early proof that “decent launch” is not good business.

Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning — Revenue: $55M | Budget: $95M | Loss: $40M | A state-sponsored fantasy crater.

Syndicate — Revenue: $18M | Budget: $50M | Loss: $32M | Take beloved tactical IP, make generic shooter, act surprised.

Medal of Honor: Warfighter — Revenue: $55M | Budget: $80M | Loss: $25M | Military shooter also-ran; died in Call of Duty’s driveway.

Fuse — Revenue: $18M | Budget: $45M | Loss: $27M | Insomniac’s beige operation.

Lost Planet 3 — Revenue: $20M | Budget: $45M | Loss: $25M | Cold, expensive, forgotten.

The Bureau: XCOM Declassified — Revenue: $25M | Budget: $55M | Loss: $30M | Years of reboot confusion compressed into one apology product.

Dead Space 3 — Revenue: $70M | Budget: $90M | Loss: $20M | Horror franchise put into the AAA monetization blender.

Ryse: Son of Rome — Revenue: $65M | Budget: $85M | Loss: $20M | Launch-window graphics mausoleum.

Thief — Revenue: $40M | Budget: $75M | Loss: $35M | A stealth game that could not hide from its own mediocrity.

Murdered: Soul Suspect — Revenue: $12M | Budget: $35M | Loss: $23M | Title became an autopsy note.

The Order: 1886 — Revenue: $55M | Budget: $90M | Loss: $35M | Mustache tech demo; premium cinematic anemia.

Evolve — Revenue: $50M | Budget: $90M | Loss: $40M | The live-service ghost before the haunting became industry standard.

Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 5 — Revenue: $8M | Budget: $20M | Loss: $12M | Contractual obligation with wheels.

Guitar Hero Live — Revenue: $70M | Budget: $100M | Loss: $30M | Plastic instrument corpse revival.

———————————————————————————————

2009–2015 selected failure pool: Revenue $803M | Budget $1.545B | Loss $742M | Average loss $28.5M per failed game.

———————————————————————————————

Bad. Ugly. Real enough. But still human-scale.

Now the modern carcass:

******************************************************************************

=============================================================================

******************************************************************************

2020–2026: The new failure regime

Marvel’s Avengers — Revenue: $125M | Budget: $210M | Loss: $85M | The Avengers, somehow converted into homework.

Crucible — Revenue: $0M | Budget: $80M | Loss: $80M | Amazon discovered games are not a logistics problem.

Bleeding Edge — Revenue: $8M | Budget: $35M | Loss: $27M | Xbox content vapor in hero-shooter clothing.

Hyper Scape — Revenue: $20M | Budget: $90M | Loss: $70M | Ubisoft chased Fortnite after Fortnite had already become a country.

Godfall — Revenue: $35M | Budget: $70M | Loss: $35M | PS5 launch-window loot chandelier.

Disintegration — Revenue: $4M | Budget: $35M | Loss: $31M | The market did not disintegrate; the game did.

Fast & Furious Crossroads — Revenue: $5M | Budget: $35M | Loss: $30M | Family could not save it.

Predator: Hunting Grounds — Revenue: $15M | Budget: $40M | Loss: $25M | Asymmetrical shrug.

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance — Revenue: $15M | Budget: $45M | Loss: $30M | The license rolled a natural one.

Destruction AllStars — Revenue: $10M | Budget: $60M | Loss: $50M | Sony looked at Rocket League and learned nothing.

Outriders — Revenue: $70M | Budget: $115M | Loss: $45M | Not dead on arrival, but spiritually unrecouped.

Back 4 Blood — Revenue: $95M | Budget: $140M | Loss: $45M | Left 4 Dead without the valve.

Battlefield 2042 — Revenue: $175M | Budget: $250M | Loss: $75M | A major franchise launched like a public-sector IT project.

Babylon’s Fall — Revenue: $5M | Budget: $75M | Loss: $70M | Live-service humiliation ritual; nearly unplayable as a business thesis.

CrossfireX — Revenue: $10M | Budget: $65M | Loss: $55M | Xbox shooter nobody remembers because remembering requires evidence.

Saints Row — Revenue: $70M | Budget: $130M | Loss: $60M | Rebooted the audience out of the room; Volition closed.

Gotham Knights — Revenue: $95M | Budget: $145M | Loss: $50M | Four Bat-adjacent employees in search of momentum.

The Callisto Protocol — Revenue: $105M | Budget: $165M | Loss: $60M | Expensive horror without Dead Space’s soul.

Forspoken — Revenue: $75M | Budget: $150M | Loss: $75M | Cuff banter ate the P&L.

Redfall — Revenue: $35M | Budget: $120M | Loss: $85M | Arkane made to wear the live-service dunce cap; studio closed.

Immortals of Aveum — Revenue: $40M | Budget: $125M | Loss: $85M | $125M magic shooter in a year when nobody had room for one.

Hyenas — Revenue: $0M | Budget: $110M | Loss: $110M | Sega shot it before it reached the public; mercy killing as corporate governance.

Payday 3 — Revenue: $35M | Budget: $75M | Loss: $40M | A heist game that stole goodwill from itself.

Exoprimal — Revenue: $45M | Budget: $100M | Loss: $55M | Dinosaurs, suits, and no cultural footprint.

Wild Hearts — Revenue: $55M | Budget: $115M | Loss: $60M | Monster Hunter without Monster Hunter’s gravity.

Crime Boss: Rockay City — Revenue: $8M | Budget: $45M | Loss: $37M | Celebrity slop with a felony smell.

Atlas Fallen — Revenue: $18M | Budget: $55M | Loss: $37M | Mid-budget sand, AAA delusions.

The Lord of the Rings: Gollum — Revenue: $4M | Budget: $35M | Loss: $31M | A licensed-game goblin found dead in public.

Synced — Revenue: $2M | Budget: $50M | Loss: $48M | Free-to-play failure number 9,000.

Nightingale — Revenue: $18M | Budget: $65M | Loss: $47M | Early-access fog, big-team expectations.

Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League — Revenue: $60M | Budget: $260M | Loss: $200M | Batman desecration with loot numbers; a $200M theology problem.

Skull and Bones — Revenue: $80M | Budget: $250M | Loss: $170M | Ten years to make boats worse than Assassin’s Creed IV.

Concord — Revenue: $2M | Budget: $220M | Loss: $218M | Eight years, two weeks, refunds, studio dead; anthropology.

Foamstars — Revenue: $8M | Budget: $50M | Loss: $42M | Square Enix foam party funeral.

XDefiant — Revenue: $35M | Budget: $110M | Loss: $75M | Ten million tire-kickers, then the shooter graveyard.

Unknown 9: Awakening — Revenue: $10M | Budget: $70M | Loss: $60M | Transmedia nobody asked for.

Star Wars: Hunters — Revenue: $15M | Budget: $65M | Loss: $50M | A Star Wars product that felt peripheral to its own existence.

South Park: Snow Day — Revenue: $12M | Budget: $40M | Loss: $28M | Budget-game energy, franchise-disappointment math.

Alone in the Dark — Revenue: $15M | Budget: $50M | Loss: $35M | The title warned everyone.

Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn — Revenue: $12M | Budget: $45M | Loss: $33M | AA body, AAA expectations, subscription fog.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard — Revenue: $140M | Budget: $230M | Loss: $90M | 1.5M players and EA still saw a miss; that is the whole disease.

Star Wars Outlaws — Revenue: $160M | Budget: $250M | Loss: $90M | Ubisoft open-world sacrament meets exhausted audience.

Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora — Revenue: $125M | Budget: $220M | Loss: $95M | Gorgeous jungle, no necessity.

Homeworld 3 — Revenue: $18M | Budget: $70M | Loss: $52M | Legendary PC name, modern commercial faceplant.

Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown — Revenue: $10M | Budget: $65M | Loss: $55M | Open-world racing without a reason.

MultiVersus relaunch — Revenue: $25M | Budget: $100M | Loss: $75M | Warner found a way to make Bugs Bunny financially ominous.

———————————————————————————————

2020–2026 selected failure pool: Revenue $1.942B | Budget $5.230B | Loss $3.288B | Average loss $74.7M per failed game.

———————————————————————————————

There it is.

And that understates it, because the new failure also vaporizes six years, a roadmap, a hiring plan, a brand, a studio, and the next game that never gets greenlit. A 2009 flop was a mistake. A 2026 flop is six years of executive consensus, swollen payroll, brittle technology, consultant paste, content-roadmap delusion, monetization desperation, IP strip-mining, and a launch price that makes the customer feel like he is being asked to pay tuition at a mediocre private college.

The customer looks at $79.99 and thinks: no.

He has Fortnite. He has Roblox. He has Minecraft. He has Steam sales. He has Game Pass. He has a backlog. He has Balatro. He has Helldivers. He has Elden Ring. He has old games that still work. He has indies made by six people with taste. He has AA games that do not need a compliance department to invent a protagonist. AAA’s problem is not that games got expensive. AAA’s problem is that games got expensive and worse at the same time.

The old model was: make a game, sell the game, maybe make another.

The new model is: spend $220M, chase engagement, add store, add pass, add roadmap, add consultants, add multiplayer, add metrics, add franchise synergy, remove joy, ship late, sell badly, blame market conditions, fire staff, repeat.

Huge Teams.

Huge Budgets.

Hugh Prices.

Huge Losses.

The Absolute State of AAA is not a crash like 1983.

It is uglier.

It is a crash where the revenue line still exists, the executives still smile, and the machine still works just well enough to keep humiliating itself.

Bionic Commando was a flop. Concord was a civilization report.

(https://xoxohth.com/thread.php?thread_id=5875481&forum_id=2#49950341)