Super Smash Bros creator says the $600k he spent on his YouTube channel was "an investment toward a brighter future for games," so it's fine he made no money off it
Oct. 22, 2024Despite 80 million views, Masahiro Sakurai didn’t see a single yen
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Super Smash Bros and Kirby creator Masahiro Sakurai has revealed that he put nearly $600,000 into hisYouTubechannel, and hasn’t seen a penny in return.
In his final video, uploaded to the channel earlier today, Sakurai announced that he’d actually filmed almost all of his 260 releases more than two years ago,and had spent much of the time since working on a new game. The final video doesn’t dwell on that new title, however, instead explaining the lengths that Sakurai went to to bringhis video projectto life.
But for all that output, Sakurai hasn’t seen a single yen back from his project, because the entire thing isn’t monetized. It’s hard to get a true sense of how much Sakurai could have made from the videos, but having garnered 80 million views across his Japanese and English language channels, an average YouTube return of $6 per 1,000 views suggests he’d have made back a little under $500,000. With a final video (and any future views) adding to that total, there’s a chance Sakurai could have broken even on the project eventually.
He does joke, twice, that the decision not to monetise the channels was a “silly” one, but he has his reasons for making that decision. “However, and I truly mean this,” he says, “I consider this an investment toward a brighter future for games,” outlining his hopes that players will use his archive of videos to gain a greater appreciation for game design, and developers will use it as inspiration if they’re stuck. “The jury is still out for now,” he admits, “but for the money I put into it, I’d say the channel turned out well enough.”
Super Smash Bros' Masahiro Sakurai says “I’m so sorry” to players who spent “hundreds or even thousands of hours” in his fighting game.
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I’m GamesRadar’s news editor, working with the team to deliver breaking news from across the industry. I started my journalistic career while getting my degree in English Literature at the University of Warwick, where I also worked as Games Editor on the student newspaper, The Boar. Since then, I’ve run the news sections at PCGamesN and Kotaku UK, and also regularly contributed to PC Gamer. As you might be able to tell, PC is my platform of choice, so you can regularly find me playing League of Legends or Steam’s latest indie hit.
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