Following the recent devastating leak from a ransomware attack, Insomniac Games’ future has been laid out for the internet to see. Everything from in-development games to the firm’s internal, aspirational roadmap, and employee information was released by malicious operators who attempted to secure millions of dollars for the data.
In a financial document, the development costs, sales, and shares for every game Insomniac has worked on for years were revealed in full. It was noted by eagle-eyed gamers that Sunset Overdrive, the 2014 game co-developed by Insomniac Games, has netted the company just $567 in profit since it was released.
The Cost of Development
Sunset Overdrive was a bizarre, quirky, and adventurous Xbox and PC exclusive game that was released to a relatively positive reception. It didn’t take the market by storm, but it was enjoyed by gamers the world over, boasting eye-popping visuals, entertaining combat, exhilarating traversal mechanics, and a story that was equal parts inventive and tongue-in-cheek.
However, thanks to the financial document that was leaked following the recent ransomware attack, we’ve learned that it wasn’t a huge payday for Insomniac Games.
Following the development of Sunset Overdrive, which cost $42,682,135, the game sold 1,898,433 units for a total of $49,737,133. That’s not a huge difference, and after costs had been divided (considering it was also co-developed between IG and Blind Squirrel Games), Insomniac made a total of $567 from Sunset Overdrive’s entire lifecycle.
It’s a testament to the fact that a game has to typically sell exorbitant amounts for the development studio to make back what it often invests in creating it. Perhaps that’s why IG pivoted to being a Marvel studio – that’s where the money is.
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Not exactly true since all 3 spiderman games and their wolverine game use the engine Microsoft paid them to design and MS only got a single game out of them.
I also wonder if they used the engine in their VR titles but it’s not likely
Anyways not all projects are about profit. Since insomniac didn’t pay a dime for the funding it meant their staff got paid the entire time along with bonuses so after that they supposedly made $557 but it’s not like they would earn much profit as a contracted developer anyways. They got paid after all. Now it would be an issue if they lost money
Chances are the real profit opportunities were tied to sales and despite being an amazing game to this day… It just didn’t sell, not even on PC.
It’s also been on GamePass since GP existed, so for years now anyone who really wants to play it just goes that route.
That’s a crying shame. Seriously. Sunset overdrive fired on all cylinders from the very get-go. Expansions took it even farther. It might not be good enough to woo the staunchest critics of open-worlds games, but… This made me legit sad.
Obviously the entirety of revenue and vast majority of profits went to its publisher, Microsoft (both Xbox One and Steam iirc). The two co-dev studios would only see profits once MS was satisfied with ROI.
Whatever millions the devs made, it was when Microsoft fronted them $49M US for the creation of the game. That’s what it means to publish; mostly paying the dev salaries (and other overhead).
I wonder what the cutoff date for that was? I bought the game earlier this year on a steam sale. I’ve seen people buying it slowly between sales, so it’s not like the sales have completely dried up. They’re just very minimal these days.
I’m not sure what is more disgraceful. The stuff being leaked or people revealing and spreading what was leaked…
Journalism really is dead when it starts to rely on the misfortune and exploitation of others.