How long do you feel is a proper development cycle for games?

Personally, I think two years is the bare amount of time to get a title out of the door with enough polish and features to be worthy of a sixty dollar investment. If you simply have to have a yearly release, the method that Call of Duty uses is ideal, because it still give a true two year development cycle. This year will mark the return of the NBA Live/Elite franchise after a two year hiatus and I think that game will show marked improvement in all areas because of the extra development time taken.

Development time depends on the game and the time it takes to finish it.

Whenever it is finished. Length of time a game is in development doesn't decide on whether it will be good or bad. Each game that is in development comes with its own unique challenges for the team that is working on it.

it varies from game to game and developer to developer. 3 years might seem huge for some games, but it may not be enough to really flesh out a world in one of the tolkien-following rpg's. a big action game based around a single good idea might be made well enough in a couple years. competitive games, even simple ones, might take years to balance no matter what the scale is. a small game with certain design choices (perhaps randomization) might be made in a few months. maybe the developer is inexperienced in the genre so they need time to experiment.

it's hard to put a single time frame on any broad range of games. you never know when writer's (developer's?) block will set in either. just because a game doesnt work in the exact way it was originally envisioned doesnt mean it cant be a good game eventually.

I think 3 years is the sweet spot. Not too short and not too long.

...that's what she said :P

2 to 3 years. Depends on the game and the ambition and team behind it though

I'm not so conceited as to define how long pros are supposed to work on a project.Reptylus

A sequel shouldnt come out for at LEAST 2 years, preferably 3 years that way its not so familiar.

minimum of 2 years, at the most 4 years. longer development cycles arent really a good thing in most cases, look at duke nukem forever.

For full blown retail games on the consoles or PC. A bare minimum of 2 years. Most sequels are done in 2 years. Original IPs can take 3 - 4 years to concieve, & other more ambitious games can take 3 - 5 years ( Bioshock Infinite, Elder Scrolls, an example ).

Last generation 1 yr was the minimum for a development cycle. This generations it is 2 yrs. Next generation will be 3 yrs. We will likely see a smaller library of games becuase of these longer development times. Each generation you essentially add 1 year to each development cycle.

These days, for most $60 retail games? 3 years at least, I'd say. It never seems like 2 years is enough time for developers for the big releases. They always seem to have delays or they ship the game without all of the areas completely finished to their satisfaction.

I would much rather have developers these days just take another year to really polish the game, than to just ship it out as quickly as possible, but big companies don't seem to allow that.

For smaller games, I think 2 years can work, but in the end, I want game creators to take as much time as they need to complete their games with their intended creative vision for it. Obviously though, the world of business doesn't work that way, sadly.

2-4 years, depending on the title.

4 years for a new IP, or a sequel using a new engine.

2 years for a sequel using the same engine.

3 or 4 years

We will likely see a smaller library of games becuase of these longer development times. Each generation you essentially add 1 year to each development cycle.

brucecambell

I don't think 2 years is enough. It might be the absolute bare minimum, but I don't believe a development team who wants to make a quality game will be able to do it in 2 years without feeling rushed. There are some exceptions - Uncharted 2 came out 2 years after the first and was very well done and polished in all aspects. With Uncharted 3, however, the development time was again 2 years, and this time, it was clear that the game would've benefitted greatly from some more time (but it was still a great game). They were trying out a new engine that had a few glitches that could've been worked out. The single player story also felt weak compared to the previous game, only focusing on the big set pieces like the cruise ship, so I think they could've taken some more time to fix that.

It really depends on the type of game. But 2-4 years sounds about right.

at least two years for a decent game

To take one example, the creation of a yearly development cycle for Assassin's Creed really hurt the series in my opinion. The first game had great potential, two was a big leap forward, but three felt like there was no progress and it was just more of the same. One thing people have been neglecting in this thread is that it's not just technological/gameplay developments, it's also story and narrative development. It takes authors several years to write good plots, and putting a one-year crunch on a developer tests out not just the programmers and the artists, but also the writers.masterpinky2000

I agree, its the only thing i dont like about Assassins Creed.

About a year and a half to two years. At max, no more than 4 years. When games take more than that they tend to forget what they were aiming for in the first place. Cloud_765

Untill it is done. all games development cycle is diffrent.

at least 2 years imo. maybe 3 just take make it more polished.

3-4 years is ideal but there are exceptions. The main one being Blizzard. They can take as long as they want with their games as long as the quality stays the way it is.