Home Gaming This is how much it cost to make and market The Witcher 3

This is how much it cost to make and market The Witcher 3

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Witcher 3 money

We often talk about the budgets for games. We hear about Rockstar Games spending $265 million on Grand Theft Auto V or rumors of Destiny costing a whopping $500 million although that number also included the marketing budget. You see, marketing is a key part of a game’s launch, whether people like it or not. Therefore, it’s included in the cost of making the game, and for the Witcher, we got some interesting detail on that, straight from the source.

During the CD Project Red financial briefing, CEO Adam Kicinski revealed that the game’s total budget was 306 million zloty or about $81 million USD which is current 1129934011.86 South African Rands. Now, while I go cry into my pillow about the Rand exchange rate, it’s interesting to note just how many marketing campaigns there were.

Kicinski says CD Projekt Red conducted 40 different marketing campaigns in parallel for The Witcher 3. He described this as a “daunting task,” noting that the region-specific marketing campaigns were accompanied by a global campaign, too.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt was developed over the course of 3.5 years with a total of 240 in-house staff while 1 500 people were involved in the game’s production. Kicinski pointed out that the Witcher 3 was localized in 15 different languages, seven of which had full voice acting, which meant that 500 voice actors worked on the game. That’s a lot of sound recording.

While the budget is massive and included a global marketing campaign that I’m sure included a huge spend during E3 and Gamescom considering how huge their stands were at both events, the game was still highly profitable. In fact, that $81 million was called a “good investment” as the game sold six million copies in six weeks. For the latest financial period, the company made a net profit of $62.5 million, most of which came from The Witcher 3. Not too shabby.

Last Updated: September 10, 2015

21 Comments

  1. VampyreSquirrel

    September 10, 2015 at 09:10

    Can I get 10% of their profit? Just 10%… not being greedy or anything.

    Reply

    • Admiral Chief Returns

      September 10, 2015 at 10:47

      I’d take only 1%

      Reply

  2. HairyEwok

    September 10, 2015 at 09:10

    Hmmmm what will we do if we ever got 1129934011.86 Rands. I’ll buy the president over for a start and still have some cash left to buy a gupta plane XD. Seriously that is a huge sum of cash holy crap. I wonder how many digits that will be in Zim dollar hahaha.

    Reply

    • Matthew Holliday

      September 10, 2015 at 09:25

      no one will ever know, since the only currency you CANT use in Zim, is the Zim dollar.
      not sure i could count that high anyway.

      Reply

      • oVg NOT SURE IF...

        September 10, 2015 at 09:45

        A loaf of bread from the bread basket case of Africa will cost you 1 Cecil the Lion 😛

        Reply

  3. Alien Emperor Trevor

    September 10, 2015 at 09:13

    Well deserved, and worth every penny I spent on it. Best RPG I’ve played since ME2.

    Reply

  4. oVg NOT SURE IF...

    September 10, 2015 at 09:20

    Good for CD Projekt RED they made more money than Captain Corporate while sticking to oldschool marketing.

    Where as KONAMI made wads of cash from a demo yet… Im a little worried that Kojima was not allowed to fully envision his art because FucKONAMI executives made him cut the ending.
    Apparently the end chapter and boss battle was cut leaving no closure and 7 loop holes.

    Imagine if Peter Jackson was told to stop filming because he went over budget halfway into the end showdown.

    Reply

    • Alien Emperor Trevor

      September 10, 2015 at 09:26

      Research tells them nobody plays games to the end anymore, so they don’t bother with decent endings. W3 has an old school proper ending. I spent a day with my goddamn daughter, and it was awesome even after someone brought onions into my room. The bar’s been raised. Fuck shitty & citi-golf endings.

      Reply

      • oVg NOT SURE IF...

        September 10, 2015 at 09:32

        Ya, but this was supposed to be his swan song for a franchise over 2 decades old. You would think FucKONAMI would just give him a blank cheque?

        My bet is, KONAMI wanted to release each mission as episodic content hence all the credits every 30 minutes, they sold a little piece for a demo at half full retail price, they cut the ending for future DLC or they just threw the towel in.

        SAD even if he wanted to continue his creation he will have to buy the IP back from a slot machine company 🙁

        What a waste.

        Reply

        • Alien Emperor Trevor

          September 10, 2015 at 09:37

          There’re credits after every episode? WTF for? Hope you can at least skip them.

          Reply

          • oVg NOT SURE IF...

            September 10, 2015 at 09:40

            Im hoping for style, considering how narcissistic game celebs become. But after witnessing the greed from Captain Corporate in our industry the last few years my bet is the original concept was to keep the game going for 3 years.

            You watch, Squareenix will be doing this work model.

          • Alien Emperor Trevor

            September 10, 2015 at 09:43

            They already are – the new Hitman game.

          • oVg NOT SURE IF...

            September 10, 2015 at 09:43

            fuck

  5. Dutch Matrix

    September 10, 2015 at 09:59

    I have the Witcher 3 on PS4. And yet the Sims 4 dominated my weekend…

    Reply

    • Brady miaau

      September 10, 2015 at 11:44

      You mean the game or did the family come visit?

      Bdan-tshhhh or something.

      Reply

  6. Greylingad[CNFRMD]

    September 10, 2015 at 10:15

    That profit…. Well deserved, very well deserved… Then again, they set out to make the best game they could…They did….soooo…..

    Reply

  7. Admiral Chief Returns

    September 10, 2015 at 10:46

    If they make physical Gwent cards….my money will not be safe

    Reply

    • Alien Emperor Trevor

      September 10, 2015 at 10:59

      Then I’m afraid I’ve got some… BAD NEWS!

      http://raru.co.za/video-games/3020186-the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-hearts-of-stone-pc

      Monster & Scoia’tael decks. I literally just ordered it. hehe.

      Reply

      • Admiral Chief Returns

        September 10, 2015 at 11:36

        Some of my insurance claims have paid out very recently….COINCIDENCE????? I THINK NOT!

        However, I never play those decks, I need the Nilf deck!

        Reply

        • Alien Emperor Trevor

          September 10, 2015 at 11:40

          The bone CE had a Nilf & NR deck, lucky bastards. I’m hoping they might include those in the 2nd expansion – then I’d buy the physical version again.

          Reply

  8. Ryanza

    September 10, 2015 at 12:26

    Let’s not forget about the free marketing campaign by the fans on messaging boards, comment sections, and such.

    Who here will ever forget, Don’t Support DRM. The WItcher 3 is coming.

    With all the money they made and still making. The Witcher 3 should still be selling well over the big holiday to come. Let’s hope that Cyberpunk 2077 will be good. It should though. By the third game at least.

    Don’t Support DRM. Cyberpunk 2077 is coming.

    Reply

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