Good evening, I am growing close to the point where I need a good solid budget for finishing my first game project. I am making, publishing and marketing my own 2D RPG.

The programming is almost finished, I have a vertical slice of the game complete and so the big next step is sourcing assets to fill the game out and inputting different data for different monsters etc.

I am going to write a list of everything I believe I need and would really appreciate anyone who is willing to take a look at it and let me know if there is any area I have overlooked, or any area that deserves to be split into more pieces.

Engineering

Programming (free, done by me)

Exporting (free, done by me)

Testing (mostly friends but will likely have to pay some people too)

Publishing (different costs for different platforms)

Rating (different costs for different platforms)

Art

Concept Art (contracted out, doubling as promotional material)

In Game Assets (all sprites, animations, UI and environments contracted out)

Other Promotional Art (completed by partner)

Audio

Sound Effects (either stock or contracted out)

Music (either stock or contracted out)

Marketing and Promotion

Conferences (the ambition is to show at some appropriate conferences)

Contacting Press (l may pay for a well presented press kit but the leg work will be done by me)

Business

Fees (different business fees depending on which state I register in)

Taxes (bleh)

Thank you for your time!

Excellent thank you!

Fortunately very few of these apply to me as there are no employees or business location, I am completing it as a hobby. The information did however help me understand the overheads required to run a "proper" business.

I guess the component I am most in the dark about it the publishing and ratings systems. I need to do more research on the cost of publishing on different platforms and different regions. I just became an approved Nintendo developer (yay!) so there is the possibility of releasing on Wii-U, but I know the costs of doing that will be pretty high.

Overall even if it ends up not being profitable to release on the Wii-U I might do it anyway, just to say I have done it, as a pride thing. I am lucky enough to have a day job and not need this business or project to be profitable enough for me to live on.