Acquiring funding for game development projects can be a complicated process that requires diligent research, business acumen, and persistence to go through several channels to secure your game’s future. Though many routes toward securing game development funding exist, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution, and each project will have different needs.

Crucially, funding for game development is necessary for leveraging expert service providers like Magic Media to bring your game development projects to life. Beginning the journey of gaining game development funding might be daunting, but numerous options are available regardless of your project’s ambitions.

Importance of Game Development Funding

Game development funding is an exceptionally important aspect of the game development lifecycle, from initial concept development to post-launch support. First and foremost, funding for game development projects is used to bring in the talent required to deliver high-quality games, whether that’s expert service providers or direct hires for an internal team. Further to this, game development funding is essential for providing the tools required for your talent to develop high-quality games.

Funding for game development projects is required for all aspects of game development, including marketing, operational costs, research and development, and more. Funding is also necessary to secure service providers to help or fully develop your game. This can be advantageous for many organizations that don’t have the resources or infrastructure to develop a game in-house and instead can rely on an experienced team to handle all aspects of game development.

Game Development Funding and Service Providers

Adequate game development funding can provide access to service providers who can handle aspects of your game development projects or the whole process. Without sufficient funding, studios might need to enter service agreements with inexperienced providers or in some worst-case scenarios, commit to developing the title internally while lacking the resources to create the game to the highest degree of quality possible.

In the contemporary gaming industry, post-launch support is often critical to a game’s long-term success and maximizing its shelf life. Regardless of your game’s genre or platform, ongoing post-launch support delivering new content updates, patches, and regular maintenance will ensure your game continues to serve existing players and attract new ones. Post-launch support is a huge undertaking that can be handled by an experienced and talented service provider. Without funding, the game might suffer from inadequate support and its player base could decline if existing players aren’t catered to.

Methods of Raising Game Development Funding

A popular contemporary method of raising game development funding is leveraging crowdfunding platforms. The basic premise is that a studio would present its game or game idea to the wider gaming community to gain financial support for its development. Though success is far from guaranteed, crowdfunding campaigns in the past have secured record-breaking amounts of funding for game development projects like Shenmue 3 and Pillars of Eternity. Leveraging crowdfunding platforms like Kickstarter can also foster a strong community supporting your game from its earliest days of development and creating advocates for your project in the long term.

One of the most common methods of game development funding comes from publishers. Publishers will fund game development projects in exchange for a share of profits and sometimes IP ownership. In addition to the financial gains, publishers will often lend their marketing, distribution, and QA services to help the project progress. It’s critical when pursuing game development funding from publishers that sometimes creative compromises will need to be made to align the game with the publisher’s vision in exchange for the support, as mentioned earlier.

Contact Magic Media today to learn about our extensive range of game development project service offerings, including full-cycle game development, co-development, real-time VFX, and much more. Find out how we can collaborate, and let’s create magic!