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What does it take to create a successful AAA title?
Nowadays many gamers tend to have complaints from the developers of some of their most highly anticipated titles, while other companies have been accused of taking advantage of their employees by imposing long working hours (a.k.a. “crunch”) when the games they are working on enter the final stage of production. And so, with all this in mind, now would be a perfect time to look into what is necessary to make a good video game.
Considering the way the gaming industry has expanded in the last few years, it doesn’t really come as a surprise that making any type of game, whether it’s big or small, indie or triple-A, for console or mobile, takes a large amount of effort, manpower and, most of all, capital. But, in order to paint as best a picture as possible, we’ll be taking the triple-A console title route here.
AAA title development is by no means a simple procedure and even the smallest of mistakes can set the whole effort behind even by months. Additionally, these errors add extra financial damages to the developers, who are already facing losses of around $60–80 million in order to create the game.
But let’s take it from the top. How is a game actually created? Before a game can even enter its main production phase there is an entire procedure that needs to be followed. This is known as pre-production.
