Games are costing an increasingly large amount of money to make, that's becoming increasingly clear and transparent of a situation. But what is often less talked about is the marketing force that goes behind many games.
While there is little information on marketing costs for a lot of major AAA games, a new report has come out that reveals that Monopoly Go's marketing budget is nearing the $500 million mark, as per an interview with Game File (thanks, Kotaku). The mobile game only launched back in April 2023, meaning in less than a year, the team behind the game, Scopely, has spent significantly more advertising and marketing the game than it costs to develop most AAA titles.
As a point of comparison, last year's Marvel's Spider-Man 2 is thought to have cost Insomniac around $300 million and five years to make, whereas Horizon Forbidden West and The Last of Us: Part II set back Guerrilla and Naughty Dog $212 million and $220 million, respectively. Cyberpunk 2077 was said to have cost CD Projekt Red around $440 million in total, with this figure accounting for marketing and the expenses creating the Phantom Liberty expansion too.
While Monopoly Go's marketing spend seems enormous, it should be said that the game is said to have raked in around $2 billion, meaning its marketing expenses are around a quarter of that massive figure.
If you had any doubt about the scale and potential of mobile gaming, let Monopoly Go serve as an example. At the end of the day, we all have phones, right?