henritje said:
but what about the profit they make from sold systems and games? shouldnt that cover all those costs?
360's and PS3's are actually only just starting to turn a profit. The Wii is the only system that was being sold for more than it cost to produce.
As for games, the money goes to the publishers. The console maker won't make a profit from games sales, unless they're directly involved as the publisher or in-house developer (for example, Microsoft Game Studios and Sony Computer Entertainment America/Japan/Europe).
Microsoft and Sony make money from the dev kits they sell (so that a company or person can actually make a title for that platform). That's really the only time they make money.
And as for console exclusives, well, Microsoft and Sony
pay the developer/publisher to keep it exclusive.
Now Nintendo is a different story. Most of the Wii games are made by Nintendo or use IPs that belong to Nintendo (e.g. Super Mario, Legend of Zelda, Metroid, et cetera). Therefore, Nintendo usually
does make profits from Wii titles.