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The following is a list of the most expensive video games ever developed, with a minimum total cost of US$50 million and sorted by the total cost adjusted for inflation. Most game budgets are not disclosed, so this list is not indicative of industry trends.

Lists

  – Indicates ongoing costs of development post-release

Official figures

Cancelled games

Unofficial figures

Analyst estimations

Press estimations

The following budgets have been estimated by press outlets without naming any specific analyst or firm.

See also

• Lists of video games

Notes

1. Includes ongoing costs as of 2024
2. US$100 million for initial development, US$200 million annually for ongoing development as of 2024
3. Playable elements of the game were first released in 2013, but the game remains in early access, with no final release date announced. Costs representative of development up to 2022.
4. Approximately US$316 million for original game and US$125.9 million for Update 2.0 upgrade and Phantom Liberty downloadable content
5. Update 2.0 upgrade and Phantom Liberty downloadable content
6. US$40.9 million for Update 2.0 and US$62.7 million for Phantom Liberty DLC
7. Unannounced game
8. ^ Projected figure
9. US$19.3 million for marketing and US$5.1 million for production of physical copies
10. Licensing fee
11. Chris Baker, former interactive manager at Marvel Games, disputed Deadpool's US$100 million figure in 2024 and claimed the actual budget was "not even close".

References

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36. ^ Purchese, Robert (April 19, 2013). "Heavy Rain cost €16.7 million to make and made Sony "more than €100 million"". Eurogamer.net. Retrieved March 18, 2014.
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44. "Half-Life 2: $40 million in, still Steaming forward". Eurogamer. March 22, 2004. Retrieved June 16, 2016.
45. Eisenbeis, Richard (October 17, 2014). "The Long Development of Korea's Next Big MMORPG". Kotaku. Retrieved July 11, 2022.
46. Plunkett, Luke (April 13, 2010). "Why The Halo MMO Was Cancelled". Kotaku. Archived from the original on June 19, 2018. Retrieved April 12, 2016.
47. Frank, Allegra (May 12, 2016). "Report: Fable Legends was a $75M project 'nobody' wanted to work on". Polygon. Retrieved June 7, 2016.
48. Zelfden, N. Van (February 16, 2009). "What's Killing the Video-Game Business?". Slate. ISSN 1091-2339. Retrieved August 26, 2015.
49. Schreier, Jason (November 3, 2021). "Take-Two's 2K Cancels $53 Million Game From Hangar 13". Bloomberg News. Retrieved November 8, 2021.
50. "GTA V dev costs over $137 million, says analyst". gamesindustry.biz. February 1, 2013. Retrieved January 2, 2017.
51. ^ Takahashi, Dean (October 31, 2018). "Red Dead Redemption 2 could hit 20 million in sales — and turn a profit — by December". VentureBeat. Archived from the original on November 1, 2018. Retrieved March 1, 2021.
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53. Bolding, Jonathan (November 7, 2020). "Square Enix reports $48M loss following release of underperforming Marvel's Avengers". PC Gamer. Retrieved November 9, 2020.
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55. Nunneley, Stephany (September 8, 2011). "Max Payne 3 could cost Rockstar $105 million to develop, says analyst". VG247. Retrieved August 29, 2021.
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70. Evenson, Laura (September 9, 1994). "Video games getting movie-style premieres". San Francisco Chronicle. p. 15. Retrieved October 10, 2021 – via Newspapers.com.
71. Kronke, David (October 15, 1994). "It's Gonna Be a Video Jungle Out There: Video-game stars Donkey Kong and Sonic the Hedgehog will battle it out with new games backed by tech advances and mega-marketing". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on September 18, 2015. Retrieved May 26, 2020.
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• Money
• Video games
• Lists

• Lists of most expensive things
• Video game development
• Lists of video games