Making a game (RPG) what investment + cost questions

So... after last year going through the adventure of writing and self publishing a book I have another adventure I am looking to go on.

What I am looking to do, is make a relatively good RPG via RPGMaker MV. Before you knock it, there have been a good number of successful RPGMaker games in the Steam and Mobile markets- they all however have one running theme - 90% of the assets are custom.

I would not be looking for financial success - this would be a personal endeavor, much like my book.

I have in my circle of friends some talented people yet there are some spots where I would need to pay for certain assets etc.

What I do not know is what to pay when seeking out certain aspects.

How much should I pay for art assets? animated pixel characters, character portraits, bosses and minion art, background scenes or enviroment tile sets etc.

How much would music go for, overworld themes, town music etc.

Custom scripting is available to make modifications to the main system of the game - It uses JavaScript with HTML5 output for things such as system mods, UI modifications etc.

I invested around 1k in my book in terms of buying my own ISBNs, doings my own copyright registrations, prints and typesetting etc.

I expect the expense for this project to be well more than that and may not be my 2017 project but a 2017-18 project.

I am mostly looking to see what exactly I can expect to spend by outsourcing certain things- some of them such as certain art aspects and music I have contacts for, but I don't want to sit down and talk to them and offer something too low etc.

Thanks for the input!

Thanks for the info and links. I have a few friends that I am wanting to reach out to and see if they want to join the project - however I do not want to offer them something that's below rate or insulting lol.

There is always just an offer of being part of it, and if there is any sort of profit it would go to paying them - but as I said that's doubtful and NOT something I am going to project. I do want to sell the end result so assets must be able to be modifiable under they license - or well used as a template enough that I can change it to be totally new.

Thanks for the insight and links. I this will be a fun project.

Thanks for the offer a_skeleton_03 I may reach out to this community as I know we have lots of talent.

It is a passion of love and time- and I know how projects can get out of hand very fast, very easy. That's why although the people I am thinking about for art and music would maybe do it for free- I would actually rather pay them and have a more solid delivery date than not and it just takes fffooorrrever.

While I would like this to be just my 2017 project, I can easily see it may go over to 2018 lol. Axion Verge was like WOW one person had the latent to make all of this!

I may do a kickstarter just to gather some funds for the payments, but I have 0 expectations that I would get 1$ for "Hey, I want to make an RPG - I need $ to buy assets, give me money" - but I think it may get some slight fundage (i.e few hundred) if I could produce a nice demo that has at least some custom assets and can portray potential in plot, story, system, characters, art, and music etc.

Axiom Verge is inspiring - but like "I cant do ALL that OMG"

Asdivine Deios was inspiring in the terms of, if THIS can make it to the WiiU and other consoles - and have sequels! I know I can produce a game better than that!