This August, PlayStation experienced one of its worst failures ever, and perhaps the worst gaming failure of all time: “Concord.” Concord, a first-party PlayStation game, was planned to be a hero shooter game (similar to “Overwatch”). However, it did not have a long life. Soon after its August 23rd release, Sony announced that they would refund all sales, pull the game from stores, and shut down servers on September 6th. So what happened with “Concord,” one of gaming’s biggest failures, and what can the gaming industry learn?
“No one wants to pay-to-play.” said history teacher Mr. Andrew Weber. “It’s the free-to-play games that are popular.”
This is perhaps “Concord”’s biggest weakness: Its forty dollar price tag. Games that it would have competed with, such as “Overwatch 2” and “Valorant”, are free-to-play games, so fans would have immediately been turned away by having to pay.
Concord needed to stand out against its competitors to succeed.
“It’s fun to play, but people become bored with it over time.” said junior Marcus Montescarlos concerning viral games.
“It needs to do something new, something no one has done before,” said sophomore Max Ferrazza.
It failed in that regard, too. In reviews written by companies such as IGN, the characters were deemed uninteresting and the game modes were poorly received. Many fans haven’t even heard of the game until after it failed.
”Concord? I think I have [heard of it].” said sophomore Joe Lang.
PlayStation had a hope for the live service industry. It remains to be seen if “Concord” is a one-time fail or a warning of things to come.
“[W]e aim to launch more than 10 live-service games by the fiscal year ending March 31, 2026” said Hiroki Totoki, executive deputy president and CFO of Sony in 2022. “Concord” warns Sony of the potential consequences of proceeding down this path. If they do so anyway, It could lead to disastrous consequences. However, if they turn around and scrap their live service projects, it could lead to some of their biggest successes.
It is also worth noting that PlayStation has really wanted to cover up the failure of “Concord”. The same day that the servers shut down was the same day that “Astro Bot” came out. The fact that they feel the need to cover up one of their biggest failures with one of their biggest successes of the year is another sign to how much of a failure the game is.
In the end, “Concord” fails in two main categories: it is disinteresting as a game due to bad design and inaccessible due to bad marketing and pricing. The gaming industry should learn a very important lesson, and that is to do exactly the opposite. Games can go from failures like “Concord” to masterpieces through reasonable pricing, interesting design, and widespread marketing.