Rumors

AAA Game Development Budgets Have Now Exceeded $300 Million

According to Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier in a recent BlueSky post, budgets for modern AAA games have now reached or surpassed $300 million, specifically in the U.S. and Canada. He also claims that the current trend of layoffs and studio closures in the industry is a result of these incredibly high budgets, particularly in the North American market.

Exact budgets of video-game productions can be tough to corroborate (more transparency from publishers would be nice!) but the numbers I've heard floating around AAA game dev these days are $300 million or more — sometimes much more! — which I think helps explain the current state of the industry

— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier.bsky.social) 2026-03-25T20:38:45.547Z

“Exact budgets of video-game productions can be tough to corroborate (more transparency from publishers would be nice!), but the numbers I’ve heard floating around AAA game dev these days are $300 million or more — sometimes much more! — which I think helps explain the current state of the industry,” wrote Schreier. He also added that these high costs typically stem from developer salaries and overhead expenses, not executive salaries.

Sony Interactive Entertainment recently shut down Dark Outlaw Games. The studio was established just a year ago in March 2025 and was led by Call of Duty veteran Jason Blundell. Additionally, according to J-Soul on ResetEra, Dark Outlaw Games was in the early stages of its first game before its closure. Blundell had also co-founded Deviation Games, an indie studio working with Sony on a new IP before it was shut down two years ago in March 2024, after Blundell left the studio in September 2022. Before this, Sony shut down Bluepoint Games earlier this year, the developer behind Demon’s Souls and Shadow of the Colossus remakes. Bluepoint Games was acquired by Sony in September 2021, about a year after the release of the Demon’s Souls remake.

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Abdul Saad

Abdul Saad is a seasoned entertainment journalist and critic and has been writing for five years on multiple gaming sites. When he isn't writing or playing the latest JRPG, he can be found coding games of his own or tinkering with something electrical.