The Most Expensive Video Game in History: Activision's "Destiny" Gamble

All sorts of big video-game announcements came out of this month's E3 conference. A company making one of the biggest splashes was Bungie, the studio that created the Halo series that became the Xbox's marquee franchise. The studio separated from Microsoft  in 2007 and produced its last game in the series -- Halo: Reach -- back in 2010. 

Since breaking from Microsoft, the studio signed a 10-year publishing deal with Activision Blizzard . The first game under this agreement, Destiny, is slated for a September release. Destiny is a hugely important game for a simple reason: It's the most expensive game ever made. Activision's CEO let slip at an investing conference that he believe Destiny will cost $500 million in development costs and marketing. That's more than $200 million more in costs than the next most expensive game, Grand Theft Auto 5. 

Aside from the massive costs sunk into the project, Destiny is a risk because it's creating an ambitious melding of a first-person shooter and role-playing game. Luckily for Activision Blizzard, most reviews of Destiny were largely positive. With Call of Duty appearing to be a franchise that's slipping in popularity, it's important that Destiny could become another marquee bankable franchise for the company. 

In this episode of The Next, Motley Fool tech analyst Eric Bleeker and Rule Breakers analyst Simon Erickson talk about this year's E3, and also some of the disappointment around Microsoft. As expected, there won't be a new Halo game in 2014, which only compounds the Xbox One's early struggles. 

To see their full thoughts, watch the following video.