--- title: Production vs. Marketing Budgets | daily.dev description: Veteran game developer Tim Cain explains the difference between production and marketing budgets in the games industry, tracing how marketing spend has grown... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/production-vs-marketing-budgets-leenttayb twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Production vs. Marketing Budgets | daily.dev og:description: Veteran game developer Tim Cain explains the difference between production and marketing budgets in the games industry, tracing how marketing spend has grown... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/production-vs-marketing-budgets-leenttayb og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/LEENTtAyb.png og:image:alt: Production vs. Marketing Budgets og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Production vs. Marketing Budgets **[Cain on Games](https://daily.dev/sources/cainongames)** · 10 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary Veteran game developer Tim Cain explains the difference between production and marketing budgets in the games industry, tracing how marketing spend has grown from near-zero to sometimes exceeding production costs. He outlines three core reasons companies invest in marketing: discoverability (making players aware the game exists), image (saturation advertising that builds perceived quality), and ratings (legal but ethically grey tactics like press trips, early access, and developer access to influence reviewer scores). He draws parallels to the movie industry, where marketing budgets exceeding production budgets became common first. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - ["I literally built an investment firm that wouldn't have funded my own pitch" – Why the money isn't reaching the games that need it](https://daily.dev/posts/i-literally-built-an-investment-firm-that-wouldn-t-have-funded-my-own-pitch-why-the-money-isn-t--pxzne4lqo) · GamesIndustry.biz · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Four tips for pitching your game to investors and publishers](https://daily.dev/posts/four-tips-for-pitching-your-game-to-investors-and-publishers-6emzjr2eo) · Game Developer · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [How Much Does It Cost to Make a Video Game? 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