Why Video Game File Sizes Keep Getting Bigger

In 1985, Super Mario Bros. was able to store its entire game on approximately 40 kilobytes of cartridge space. Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 for the PlayStation 5 can fit up to 166 GB in the game’s installation. That’s around four million times more space for one game when it comes to Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 for the PlayStation 5. This significant jump demonstrates that video games have changed, boasting increasingly extravagant graphics, expansive worlds, and rich details that require more storage to depict. That same craving for details reflects in the craft beer arena, as people now demand the same level of attention to be given to their beer session, from the choice of brew to its presentation. Regardless of business, technology has created boundless opportunities for creativity and increased guest expectations for the total end-user experience.

This was not by any means a growth solely attributable to one factor. 

Every generation dropped a limitation on storage, and software developers would fit more powerful graphics, sound, charming music, and larger worlds in that newly freed-up space, while adding some marketability features to the games that were nonessential just for the sake of giving them more storage. Every generation, the memory cap was dropped, and developers stuffed in sharper games, richer audio, and larger worlds, and some marketability features that were less significant than space requirements.

Four Decades of Growth at a Glance

The table below tracks landmark releases across four decades of home gaming. Sizes are approximate and refer to the original release or install, since patches and later editions often change them considerably. For fans planning a game day, these figures also offer an interesting look at how gaming has evolved over the years.

The steepest jumps arrived once games were installed to internal drives and downloaded digitally, which removed the hard ceiling that a cartridge or disc once imposed. Patches compound the effect, and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and Warzone together passed 200 GB on PC after a period of updates.

What Every Extra Gigabyte Costs Players

Large installs are true to measure in storage requirements. One of the PS5’s has an 825 GB drive with a base game folder occupying approximately 667 GB, which amounts to about a quarter of the base drive, while an Xbox Series X will have about 802 GB available after installing its base game folder. For instance, Nintendo Switch 2’s 256 GB of internal storage is feeling the pinch sooner.

Slower Internet connections will be burdened by download times. At a constant speed of 50 Mbps, a 150 GB download takes less than seven hours, and big day-one patches can further extend wait times (until a brand-new version is playable).

Online casino games are the opposite, where the majority aren’t downloaded and run inside a browser. At an online casino such as richards casino, the practical questions are how quickly games load on mobile data, how much data live dealer streams use, and even if an app is needed at all.

The Cartridge Years: Every Kilobyte Counted

Games were small on the cartridge as memory was costly and any additional chip increased the price of an additional game. Super Mario Bros. was shipped with 32KB of program code and 8KB of graphics data, and its clouds and bushes take the same shape, but recolored.

Technology could not outpace those limits as they surfaced in a way that influenced design as well. 

As much as developers could, they used the same tiles, sprites, and music over and over again, as the hobbyist studios do when they create new NES games, with Micro Mages being a recent example of continuing that tradition to the 40 KB maximum. They were also not so roomy, as Pac-Man wouldn’t even fit in under 50 KB of data in 1980.

The Disc Era: Room for Video and Sound

CD-ROMs held around 650 MB, more than ten thousand times the space of an early cartridge, and developers filled them with pre-rendered cutscenes and recorded audio. Final Fantasy VII still needed three discs in 1997, largely because of its full-motion video. Compared with today’s massive install sizes, however, those early storage demands offer a reminder of how dramatically gaming technology has advanced.

DVDs raised the ceiling to 4.7 GB on a single layer, enough for open worlds such as Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas with hours of recorded dialogue and licensed music. Blu-ray then offered 25 GB per layer, and the PS3 and Xbox 360 generation made installing games to a hard drive common, the first step towards today’s download-driven sizes.

The HD and 4K Era

After the mid-2010s, the sizes of even the earlier “mid-range” installable games increased from tens of gigabytes to a hundred and many more. Three technological factors had more than anything else culled the numbers: larger worlds and support cycles, and higher screen resolutions. Some of these were decisions that had nothing to do with visual considerations.

Textures Built for Bigger Screens

A texture is an image that is wrapped around a 3D model, and if it is double the resolution in both directions, it will be four times the size before compression. Textures for 4K games are hugely richer than for 720p games, and open worlds will require different things for each region of the world. Red Dead Redemption 2 was 99 GB in size on PlayStation 4, and the PC version required 150 GB of disk space, highlighting the growing size of modern games as developers push for increasingly realistic visuals.

Audio Nobody Compressed

Sounds can occupy more space than you’d imagine. About 35 GB of uncompressed audio had already been included in Titanfall when it hit PC in 2014, and Respawn feared that such compression would strip the processing power from the very entry-level PC specs.

Dialogue in multiple languages contributes to that, and even some games, if the platform doesn’t support selective downloads, will send each language pack to each player. Pre-rendered cutscenes add their own weight (If video is compressed, it is usually not compressed severely to preserve its quality; thus it consumes a lot of space).

Data Copied for Hard Drives

However, hard drives that spin up to find data are slow; as a result, developers typically have a tendency to store the same properties in a number of places to shorten loading duration. Some data about lampposts and footpaths was repeated up to 400 times for that very reason, revealed Mark Cerny, lead architect of the PS5, in his remarks at the FPS presentation. In fact, some lamppost and pedestrian data was duplicated up to 400 times in Spider-Man in Marvel due to that reason, Mark Cerny, lead architect of the PS5, revealed at the FPS presentation.

The elimination of such needs is provided by solid-state drives, and Sony said that its SSD would either reduce the size of games or give gamers a bit more room for richer and more intricate games.

Can Compression Turn the Tide?

Platform holders are now starting to have a few tools to help them regulate installs:

• Hardware decompression. The PS5 decodes the Kraken-compressed data in specialized hardware, while the Control Ultimate Edition loaded in about 26 GB on the PS5 versus just a little bit over 42.5 GB on Xbox Series X.
• Smarter texture formats. Image data can be preprocessed to compress better with tools like OodleTexture but without discernible loss of quality.
• Modular installs. A fragmented game also ensures that only the modes the player uses are installed on his or her console, and Black Ops 7’s PS5 listing reveals that it separates its co-op game and Warzone as two downloads.
• Cloud streaming. The 2024 version uses only about 30 GB for the Database for its installation on Xbox (relatively a quarter of the previous one) and streams detailed scenery for each flight path.
• Optional texture packs. In certain PC versions, they have the raw textures available to download separately so lower-resolution devices can play without downloading the highest-quality textures.

That’s what Cerny ought to be reminding the reader of, as the space he saves could be made more useful to the player for creating larger, more detailed worlds.

Game Over for Small Downloads?

With every new generation, there’s a removal of the limit, filling the void with video and sound, then high-resolution textures, multiple language options, and years of live advancements. Doubled data and uncompressed audio are some of those workarounds that have been removed by the faster hardware.

While compression, modular installs, and cloud streaming tend to slow down the evolution, bigger worlds and sharper screens are forcing the other direction of change. For gamers, however, it does still imply additional storage, higher internet speed, and a fancier way of downloading only parts of a game that aren’t being played. The same desire for efficiency applies to the brewing industry, in which a brewery can deal with stock efficiently and make sure that the right brewing machines are in place to reduce waste and ensure high-quality beer is retained. Breweries can also make events more appealing by offering a reward package that encourages customer loyalty without creating unnecessary costs. In both cases, making better use of available resources can improve the overall experience without sacrificing what people value most.

FAQ

Call of Duty games are known for their massive download sizes, but what makes them so demanding on storage? Several factors contribute, from high-resolution graphics to expansive maps and frequent updates.

Why are Call of Duty games so big?

Each mode receives regular updates, and they put together several modes like campaign, multiplayer, Zombies, and Warzone under one umbrella. Black Ops 7 comes with up to 166 GB of content for PC, but it offers modular installs which allow gamers to skip out on modes they don’t play.

Are game file sizes going to keep increasing?

As resolutions increase and larger worlds emerge, most likely, more data is being demanded. Part of that growth is possible to counteract with hardware compression and cloud streaming, judging by the comparatively minuscule install statistics around without Disney’s most recent release, Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024.

How much storage do I need for modern games?

Plan for at least 1 TB if you play several big releases, since a single blockbuster can pass 150 GB on its own. Many console owners add an expansion SSD once the built-in drive starts to fill up.

Does a bigger file size mean better graphics?

Not always; uncompressed audio, duplicate data, and bundled language packs can bloat an install, while not adding anything significantly to its graphics. It’s all about sound, for instance, in Titanfall, which consumes most of its 48 GB PC version.