Games are only ever getting more expensive to make. It's a truth noted by game developers, called a «death sentence» by former publishing chairmen, and conveniently cited by studio executives as they explain why they need to lay off another 200 employees.
Despite the universal agreement that game development costs are rising, we rarely see exactly how much more costly they've become, especially for AAA releases.
This week, however, thanks to court filings obtained by Stephen Totilo's Game File, we've gotten a glimpse at the staggering production budgets demanded by Call of Duty games, which—as of 2020—cost well over half a billion dollars to develop.
The budget figures were disclosed in December 2024 court filings related to ongoing lawsuits against Activison and Meta, which accuse the companies of «grooming» the shooter who killed 19 students in the May 2022 school shooting in Uvalde, Texas.
As part of a declaration included in Activision's response to the lawsuit, current Call of Duty creative head Patrick Kelly provided budget estimates and associated sales figures for three Call of Duty games—2015's Black Ops 3, 2019's Modern Warfare, and 2020's Black Ops Cold War: The numbers are, to my eyes, a terrifying image of the funding expected at the costliest tier of game production.