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Concord


DisturbedSwan

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  • 1 year later...

Interest in this game seems to be basically non existent over here, or anywhere really, but it did come out yesterday and while it does have mostly positive feedback on Steam, the numbers seem exceptionally low (not even close to 1k concurrent players). Of course it's difficult to gauge interest on PS5, I'd expect it to maybe do a bit better there but it's probably not a 180° either.

 

One staff member also confirmed it was in development for eight years (https://x.com/sharkeatsman/status/1826122649963245882), which likely includes all pre-production talk, but is still a massive number for any kind of endeavour. 

 

Plus there's also the fact that not only did this have the unfortunate fate of being the new hate target for the web, but also coming out at the same day as the Monke game which seems to have swallowed up all the time and resources of journalists and content creators.

 

Basically what I'm saying is I don't think this will stay afloat for long. I watched a bit of a gameplay, I think it looks really competently made and super polished but I doubt I'd play it even if I had a platform it's come out on. I wonder whether this will shake up Sony's GAAS ambitions but more than anything I hope it's not a death sentence for the studio.

 

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It's such a strange scene to break into.  It's reminding me of that CliffyB game, Lawbreakers?  By most critical metrics it was a decent game but bombed really hard.  What breaks out and what bombs can be because of really arbitrary stuff around the pre-release.  More so than SP games.

 

I guess with SP games there is more room for a game that is a different spin on an existing concept but with MP games your concept has to be more unique for the most part.  There's that Marvel game too that it's going up against and marketing and availability may push that game in front of peoples eyes that do still want a hero shooter.

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It also seems impossible to get the timing right. Battleborn launched right next to Overwatch and was dead on arrival. Paragon was kind of midway between Overwatch and this and also died quickly and now Concord seems to repeat the tradition.

 

I honestly thought Marvel Rivals was going to bomb, too, but that seems to have garnered quite a crowd during its beta. I doubt it's the little twists on gameplay (3rd person, team moves, destructible environments), so maybe the Marvel name is still strong despite a lot of people being burned out by it. But I think it's also on mobile, that always helps of course, as well as f2p. 

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the shame about Concord is that it isn't F2P. That model pisses people off, and rightly so, but if people were able to get this free on PS+ then it would get some numbers in, people would be curious I think. Fwiw I tried playing the 1st beta but couldn't get on. Fuck paying £30 for a dead online game I might hate

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It’s easy to say but maybe the way to do live service/multiplayer games is to make it cheap and fun and build it up later. I was looking at Deadlock gameplay earlier and, mechanics aside, it looks like a 4K PS2 game. Valve has a luxury of resource no one else has, and even then it looks like it’s cooking and not 100% finished product (Graphics, UI, etc)
 

With the Sony name on it maybe they think this game has to have extra production and polish but maybe that’s not the way, and all that extra money and revision goes to a game that has an audience first. 
 

Not saying it should have no graphics and all the characters are stick men but there has to be a more cost effective way to try new things.

 

Or maybe it’s just unattractive. This game isn’t for me, but I think the characters look like shit, the game has no personality, even the name doesn’t really say anything (I guess neither does Fortnite, but just saying what I see)

 

At least something like Helldivers 2 has some kind of flair to it with Starship Troopers humour and all.

 

I dunno. I have no interest in multiplayer shooters but I hate to see failure as well. I’m not going to lose sleep over it, but hope they find a way to maybe turn it around like Seige or Sea of Thieves (Maybe they put it on Xbox 😯 )

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I forget who it was but I saw someone mention that it did a lot of completely unnecessary stuff for a multiplayer game as well, like full-mocap cutscenes and stuff like that, that needlessly blew up development time and costs. I guess in context it makes sense: Overwatch was an instant hit in 2016 but often got criticised for not having any content that delved into its characters and lore, so the pitch for this must have been to simply do both and that'll be a win. But trend chasing is already super difficult even without the burden of AAA production values.

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I don't know that there's much to be morbidly curious about, this just looks like the Forspoken of GAAS. Not a bad game but a really unremarkable one and that lack of intriguing elements is just way more damaging for a MP game so there's no reason for anyone to get it sadly. Whereas at least Forspoken has some aspects of it which stand out a little bit if you get it at a low price (I think the parkour is actually done well)

 

There's so many better MP games to check out like World of Warcraft Hardcore Mode, which I hear is supposed to be cool.

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Apparently this is down to 96 players now on steam, for a game which came out a few days ago. At this point surely the best thing is a quick and aggressive pivot to a F2P model with monetisation to onboard players.

 

Of course it's a lot easier to write that as a comment versus actualising it as a business approach and getting everyone on board with a plan that clearly wasn't the original intention.

 

It's a different genre but I think the latest Granblue fighting game had a great approach to F2P with how it cycles in different characters every week or so. Made it much easier to recommend to people

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That would only be a band-aid on the console side of things though, they also need to explore other possibilities on PC.

 

F2P with a rotating roster like we have in some fighting games doesn't seem like a bad idea, especially if they keep the 40 bucks version as a complete purchase alternative. That way they could keep the integrity of the initial plan together with the bonus of having a no entry barrier option, too.

 

But then you have to wonder if this might even help, because this seems to have a marketing and image problem as well. And there's no chance in hell Sony is going to invest more money into this to turn it into some sort of FFXIV redemption story (especially as this seems functionally decent already).

 

Morale at Firewalk must also be horrible right now. Imagine working on something for eight years and this reception is the result. 

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The numbers could also be correct and attach rates on PS5 are that bad, swear this was a thing that came up before tbh. I mean FFVII rebirth is one of the best selling PS5 games in Japan, but it also didn't sell that well in general.

 

That said I did read somewhere else that the analyst numbers here can be off by quite a lot so it might not be as low as 25000. 

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I think the Steam numbers are accurate but I think the PS5 numbers are a large guess based off the Steam numbers.

 

Not that I think this game secretly did well on PS5, just not a believer that part is correct

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