Game Dev Legend Sakurai Just Revealed He Burned $600K on YouTube With Zero Monetization
Super Smash Bros creator Masahiro Sakurai just dropped a bombshell in his final video: he's spent roughly 90 million yen (~$600k) on his 'Masahiro Sakurai on Creating Games' channel and didn't earn a single dollar.
Here's the kicker—he deliberately didn't monetize it. With 80M+ views across both channels, YouTube would've paid him ~$500k at standard rates. Adding final video views? He could've broken even easy.
Why the L? Sakurai says it was a "silly" call, but frames it as "an investment in gaming's future." He spent 6 months filming everything back in 2022, then hired editors + translators for 2 years to keep content rolling. The guy literally aged in real-time across 260 videos just to teach game design for free.
Bonus plot twist: He's been secretly working on a mystery game since 2021. No details yet, but expect an announcement soon. Sakurai used his rare break between projects to launch the channel—a once-in-a-lifetime window that cost him half a million bucks.
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Game Dev Legend Sakurai Just Revealed He Burned $600K on YouTube With Zero Monetization
Super Smash Bros creator Masahiro Sakurai just dropped a bombshell in his final video: he's spent roughly 90 million yen (~$600k) on his 'Masahiro Sakurai on Creating Games' channel and didn't earn a single dollar.
Here's the kicker—he deliberately didn't monetize it. With 80M+ views across both channels, YouTube would've paid him ~$500k at standard rates. Adding final video views? He could've broken even easy.
Why the L? Sakurai says it was a "silly" call, but frames it as "an investment in gaming's future." He spent 6 months filming everything back in 2022, then hired editors + translators for 2 years to keep content rolling. The guy literally aged in real-time across 260 videos just to teach game design for free.
Bonus plot twist: He's been secretly working on a mystery game since 2021. No details yet, but expect an announcement soon. Sakurai used his rare break between projects to launch the channel—a once-in-a-lifetime window that cost him half a million bucks.