So which is the most expensive video game ever made anyway?

We’re now less than two months away from the biggest video game release of 2026 – one of the most important modern entertainment releases of all time, in fact – and there’s little doubt in anyone’s mind that Grand Theft Auto VI will break all kinds of records and do extremely well long-term. There’s also no doubt that this will turn out to be one of the most expensive video games developed in the history of this entertainment form – it certainly looks the part – even before marketing and support costs.

Come to think of it, though, GTA VI is hardly the only modern title for the PS5/Xbox Series generation that cost an awful lot to produce and promote. Even certain games developed for the previous console generation came close to breaking the half-a-billion-dollar barrier. So which ones actually make the Top Ten of the most expensive video games ever made? Researchers over at gaming and e-sports platform Zero1 Gaming released a report based on an extensive study they conducted to answer that very question.

What they settled on is this Top Ten list.

The research examined over sixty major video game releases, over the span of the last decade or so, to find which titles cost the most to produce and promote (the final figure includes both). The report also took into consideration how long each game took to build, as well as its recommended retail price at launch. These figures were used to rank all titles from the most to the least expensive one as they currently stand, even if the cost of some is still ongoing and no adjustments for inflation were made. The results are, as one can easily see, both unsurprising and astonishing at the same time. Here’s what’s going on at the Top 5.

1. Grand Theft Auto VI

Yes, GTA VI is most definitely the most expensive video game ever, despite Take2 not having officially shared any development cost numbers or marketing expenses. Analysts and insiders all agree when it comes to the development cost range – anything between $1.2 and $1.5 billion – with marketing and support cost expected to add roughly half a billion dollars across all formats over time. Rockstar started building it back in 2014, so it took them no less than 12 years to develop the title. For context, GTA V reportedly cost $265 million to bring to market back in 2013 – and that felt like a huge budget at the time.

2. Genshin Impact

It should come as no surprise that HoYoverse’s Genshin Impact also belongs to the billion-dollar club of video games. It’s free to play – so players pay nothing upfront – yet the company has reportedly poured $1 billion so far into building and marketing it. That investment was easily recovered through in-game purchases, with the title managing to to make over $4 billion in revenue in its first two years alone. Development ran for just 3 years – so HoYoverse moved fast and spent big – and it’s ongoing but, then again, so is the enviable revenue that’s steadily coming from those in-game purchases.

3. Monopoly Go!

Yes, your eyes do not deceive you: this is the third most expensive game ever and the most expensive mobile one ever created… but with a twist. Scopely, the title’s development company, spent a reported $1 billion in marketing alone – so most of its cost went into advertising rather building it. The game launched in 2023 after 7 years of work and, being available for free, the entire return on investment came from optional in-app purchases: Monopoly Go!, in fact, went on to earn over $3 billion in revenue based on this widely-used business model. It does work for some, apparently!

4. Star Citizen and Squadron 42

Star Citizen – along with its companion story-based Squadron 42 title – are no strangers to PC gamers, who seem to love and hate it in equal measure. Cloud Imperium Games has been building it since 2011 – the longest development window of any game on this list or any other modern game by now, probably – and spent more than $1 billion over that period of time. Of that amount, about $761 million went to development and $194 million to marketing. When this article was for publication, Star Citizen was still technically not fully released, as it has yet to exit early access – making this one of the most expensive ongoing projects in gaming history.

5. Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

It’s only fitting that one of these would make the Top 5, even if yours truly did not expect it to be this one… yet here we are: this particular COD reportedly had a $700 million budget in development and marketing costs, the largest single-title spend in the franchise’s history. Activision and its studios built it in just under two years, from early 2019 to late 2020, just as the successors of both the PS4 and the Xbox One S/X were getting ready to launch – so this required separate PS5/Xbox Series versions to be ready for a November 2020 release, which probably explains in part why this Call of Duty ended up costing more than usual.

The rest of the list – Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, Call of Duty: Black Ops III, Cyberpunk 2077, Battlefield 6 and Red Dead Redemption 2 – consists of more famous AAA productions that were thought to have cost a lot to build and promote in their time. All made serious money back, even if it took a few of them more time than others, and some are still selling well during promotions. It’s safe to say, though, that Grand Theft Auto VI both cost and will make more money than any of them in less time. Will there ever be another game running on traditional consoles or PCs that will claim the top spot of this chart for itself? Not unless it’s called GTA VII, probably!