Concord Developers Caught Bragging Before Posting Sony’s $400 Million Failure

Concord was one of the The biggest game release failure in recent memorythe title garnering almost no attention during its first weekend on Steam (697 concurrent players), and ultimately Sony choosing to refund all players who purchased the $40 due to the title not reaching critical mass to be viable.

NOW, new information in the form of rumors Rumors have surfaced, and if the rumors are true, Concord developers Firewalk Studios will be in a much worse situation than initially thought. According to Colin Moriarty, a former IGN video game journalist and now owner of Last Stand Media, sources have told him that Sony has spent a staggering $400 million developing the game, including $200 million to bring the game to an alpha in 2023, and another $200 million for outside developers to finish it before release.

Moriarty said that Sony paid for most of Concord’s budget and that it was the largest budget of any game Sony had released, making Concord’s release the biggest loss Sony had ever made on a single game. Moriarty said that internally, Concord was referred to as “The Future of PlayStation“and that Sony believed this was a Star Wars-type project that would generate money for many years to come. An example of this would be the episodic releases of the Concord cinematics.

The leaders of ProbablyMonsters

VIEW GALLERY – 3 IMAGES

Additionally, the former video game journalist said that the environment at Firewalk Studios was “toxic positivity,” and that the developers were not allowed to say anything negative about the game. Specifically, Moriarty pointed out that Hermen Hulst, CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment Studio Business Group, was an advocate for Concord and that the title was “her baby“.

These allegations were corroborated by Kotaku’s Ethan Gach, who spoke to X and said: “I can corroborate the toxic positivity part. Some sources I spoke to blamed an ostrich mentality inherited from Bungie’s studio roots. A sense that the game was going to grow because the team was too good to fail. More on that next week.“

Moriarty added that the $400 million it took to develop Concord did not include the amount Sony spent on the purchase Firewalk Studios Since Probably monstersFirewalk is a company led by gaming industry veterans and led by former Bungie chairman, president, and CEO Harold Rya. Firewalk was founded in 2018 by Bungie and Activision veterans, including former Activision executive Tony Hsu and former Bungie creative director Ryan Ellis, both of whom worked on Destiny. Sony officially partnered with the developer in 2021, bringing Concord under its PlayStation Studios banner, and in 2023, Firewalk was sold to Sony.

By cross-referencing the supposed chronology with the official dates, adding the rumor “toxic positivity“Given the location of the work and the market reaction to the final product, it now appears that Concord was completely oversold to Sony as a concept. The fact that the publisher invested an additional $200 million in 2023 to outsource development indicates that the game was not in good health and that Sony really wanted to bring the title to market in the hopes that it would prove to be the next Star Wars.

Unfortunately, the “toxic positivity“The work environment would mean that any criticism of Concord would alienate employees who wanted to voice their concerns, creating an environment that punishes honest and hard-to-hear criticism as employees would consider the potential impact on their job security. This creates a strong”Yes man” culture.

It should not be underestimated that Concord is Sony’s biggest budget game and its biggest failure to date, as the publisher has made exactly $0 of an alleged investment of $400 million.