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Monetization Madness - How Games Make Money - Extra Credits

Sign up to Morning Brew for free today https://bit.ly/mbextracredits2 While we've had episodes on Free to Play games, and on some of the paid elements like lootboxes, we've never really made an episode on monetization models in video games. And that's big because like it or not, how you choose to make money off your video game can have huge effects on how you go about designing your game. So let's pry open the game and take a look at premium games, downloadable content, season passes, and yes, even loot boxes. ___________ Support the people who make this show, vote for future Extra History topics and get great perks at our Patreon! http://bit.ly/EHPatreon Subscribe & ! to our channel on YouTube at http://bit.ly/SubToEC Got more info about Extra Credits on our website at http://extracredits.site/ Grab your Extra Credits gear at the store! http://extracredits.store/ Watch this episode ad-free at https://watchnebula.com/extracredits ___________ Thanks for participating in this week's discussion! We want you to be aware of our community posting guidelines so that we can have high-quality conversations: https://www.extracredits.site/extra-credits-community-code-of-con Come chat with us live on Twitch http://bit.ly/ECtwitch Want to contact us directly? Email us: contact@extra-credits.net Interested in sponsoring an episode? Email us: extracredits@standard.tv ___________ Want more Extra Credits? Follow us on social media: Twitter : http://bit.ly/ECTweet Facebook : http://bit.ly/ECFBPage Instagram : http://bit.ly/ECisonInstagram ___________ ♪ Intro Music: "Penguin Cap" by CarboHydroM http://bit.ly/1eIHTDS ♪ Outro Music: "Coming to Chimerica" by: Binster https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR02959

Comments

Jason Youngberg

So how much of the money actually goes to the people who make the games instead of to the executives who will layoff those who do the work for the sake of a bigger bonus?

Anonymous

Unfortunately, "supporting the devs" in a lot of cases means "supporting the development studios, and enriching the ones that own them." This video seems to be skipping out on merits discussions with regards to over-monetization in favor of an overview of the mechanics being used. The talk about the decisions of how much a game "needs" to make - and who it actually goes to could easily be a couple more videos.

Jason Youngberg

Agreed. "Devs gotta eat" seems to translate into "Give the publisher owners bigger means and the devs MAY get more crumbs."

Anonymous

Typically game makers are paid a relatively fixed salary or other wage up-front. They may get some form of profit-sharing, or they may not, but for the most part, their take is fixed and up-front. Paradoxically, this means that their portion of the pie is inversely proportional to how well the game does. If a game does poorly, the working stiffs may have actually received more money than the game brought in. If a game is very successful, it will be the publisher that reaps the windfall.