Ante up!

Triple A quality games with big budget freedoms set in place for game developers seems to be the mainstream in the industry these days. Anything less feels less polished or not enough. The rising benefits of technology is what has brought the gaming industry to the wondrous bounds that we now experience today.

The graphics blur the lines between what is outside your front door and what is really fake. Sound systems are cutting edge and story telling in games rival even the most well known novels of our age. Entire worlds have been created just for us to explore!

What we once imagined in our heads just ten or so years ago has now become a thing of reality. Something some of us may not have anticipated for years to come. I know I never thought I'd be exploring the vast world of Middle Earth in Turbines mmorpg, the Lord of the Rings Online, or fighting WW3 in a globe-trotting adventure in Infinity Ward's fast-paced-shooter, Modern Warfare 3.

With the addition of ultra-realistic 3D effects that allow for the game to jump out of the screen and make us feel like we are apart of the action seems to be unthinkable.

But with all the goodies comes consequences. And these riches simply cannot be achieved without the "thing" all of us need to get by, the all so wonderful, dreamy sea of green, money.

With visceral looking graphics comes bigger sized games, faster CPUs and GPUs and of course, new development technology. But none of that comes free! Almost all of our favorite games don't fit on a single disc anymore.

For console users, the "core" of the game can be found on the disc itself, but the rest of the untold goodies have to be downloaded or installed, most likely over the internet. All of those beautiful textures and neat little features simply can't run well on a disc. PC users get a miniature booklet filled to the brim with multiple installation CDs that may take hours to install.

And with the numerous graphical enhancements now being achieved in games means we need to buy new processors and graphics cards just to keep up, which means either an entire new computer just a year into your current model, or shelling out hundreds of dollars per new component in an attempt to upgrade the now dated PC you have now.

Some developers blame the rising cost of games on a more expensive development process. To actually be financially successful, they need to sell millions of copies of their game, which is no easy feat to achieve…

Why not budget for what you can afford, and for sales number you know you will actually achieve. Don't set the bar so high that the game you just sold a million copies of ends in tragedy. Take the extra money you make and capitalize on it for a future project. One that is even bigger and better than before with proven sales statistics that can prove the game to be profitable.

Poor 38 Studios had to lay off it's entire staff just this past week due to an "economic downturn." Their first and only game, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning, however was a highly successful RPG published by EA that sold 1.2 million copies in just three months, exceeding all expectations analysts had for the game.

But what in the world happened to the poor studio to force it to shut down?

It's simple, they set the bar too high. They tried to make a triple-A quality game with a big budget similar to other, more established IPs got to take advantage of, and the outcome was firm and harsh. They overspent and probably overstaffed. The studio said that the game had to sell at least three million copies to be successful.

Why development a brand spanking new game and expect it to sell that well? Some, more developed franchises can't even reach those numbers, yet they are more successful because they spend the amount they know they can.

Game developers and publishers, please don't give me an excuse that blames the rising costs of development or that we need triple A quality games, because in reality we don't. All of us play games because they're fun, we enjoy them. They pass time. If your game is fun, we'll play them.

Just because you spent $200 million to make your flashy, oh so shiny game does not mean I'll play it. I'll laugh at all of the money you just mindlessly threw away.