system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: The process of video game development and why kickstarters need so much money for them.
gpt
Expensive workers using expensive tools.

Suppose you have five workers earning $20/hour? That's over $5,000 for every week of development! 

Suppose you have some really passionate developers willing to work poverty wages? Paying two people $5/hour for two years is still $20,000.

This is before we even cover other costs. Hardware and tools may cost over $3,000 per employee, and there are taxes and legal fees. Don't forget that Kickstarter takes a cut, and that many projects lose a huge chunk of funding, maybe as high as 30-50%, to backer rewards.

And *marketing*. Do you really think it's reasonable to spend forty grand making a game, and market it without spending a dime? Looking at major publishers, marketing is sometimes just as much of a cash drop as the development, itself.

If anything, the question isn't why their budgets are so high, but why they are so low.