5 Funding
Another key aspect to consider in creating a VGS is access to a sufficient funding to cover the development expenses. The required budget will vary depending on the design of the simulation (length, reality, complexity), or the degree of internal support available to the project team. Some of the cost that the production of a VGS involve are:
- Salary of the production team.
- Payment of the actors that will participate in the recording. This will vary depending on the number of actors required and their fees.
- Filming location fees and props required for the simulation (clothing, furniture, moulage)
- Costs of the film production team, who are responsible for creating the technical script and the video recording the simulation.
- Cost of the post-production video editing.
- Instructional designer and technical support to design the VGS interface on the software platform.
- Costs of the maintenance of the simulation as a webpage or software platform.
- Translation costs if the VGS is being created for use in more then one language.
In 2007, Huang et al. (2007) reported that there was a large variation in the cost of developing virtual simulations. At that time, the development of virtual simulations supposed costs that ranged between $10.000 and $50.000 (USD), just with 15% of them costing less than $10.000 (USD), and 34% of them more than $50.000 (USD). These authors also stablished that the average time for the complete production of a virtual simulation was 16.6 months.
Supporting the previous finding, Verkuyl et al., (2017) also estimated that the average production costs for the development of a VGS was approximately $29.000 (USD), and the maintenance costs were minimum.
Therefore, in 2023, production of an average length VGS (12 decision points with minimal branching storylines using available open-access software) can range in cost from 29.000€ to 50.000€.
