Sony on Concord's Failure: 'We Won't Make the Same Mistakes Again' - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 13 June 2025 / 7,636 Views
Sony Interactive Entertainment last year quickly delisted Concord following the games launch and ultimately shut down developer for the game Firewalk Studios.
PlayStation Studio Business Group CEO Hermen Hulst during Sony's Business Segment presentation and fireside chat stated they have learned their lessons from Concord's failure.
"There are some unique challenges associated [with live service titles]," Saud Hulst (via Game Developer). "We've had some early successes as with Helldivers II. We've also faced some challenges, as with the release of Concord.
"I think that some really good work went into that title. Some really big efforts. But ultimately that title entered into a hyper-competitive segment of the market. I think it was insufficiently differentiated to be able to resonate with players. So we have reviewed our processes in light of this to deeply understand how and why that title failed to meet expectations—and to ensure that we are not going to make the same mistakes again."
Hulst added PlayStation Studios has implemented a more rigorous process for validating its creative, commercial, and development assumptions and hypothesis.
"We do that on a much more ongoing basis," he stated. "That's the plan that will ensure we're investing in the right opportunities at the right time, all while maintaining much more predictable timelines for Marathon."
He said Marathon test cycles have yielded "varied" feedback and the mixed impressions have been "super useful."
He added, "That's why you do these tests. The constant testing and constant revalidation of assumptions that we just talked about, to me, is so valuable to iterate and to constantly improves the title. So when launch comes we're going to give the title the optimal chance of success."
The next big live service game from PlayStation is Bungie's Marathon, which will launch for the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC via Steam on September 23.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can follow the author on Bluesky.
More Articles
Are they even aware of the mistakes they made? Especially over roughly the last decade...
I bought PS3 and PS4 for their single-player games
The studio that made 3 Uncharted and Last of Us games for PS3 is now trying to fit one game into one generation, using increasing costs as an excuse.
Huge budgets were spent on ordinary shooter games that didn't include a campaign mode. Maybe if someone who hated Playstation was the president, they wouldn't be able to damage the brand this much.
Playstation just needs to be Playstation and let the chips fall where they may. That's what Nintendo does. They don't screw around. They do what they do, good or bad. Sony should do what they do and forget the rest.
Whats with obsession with live service games? Just let it go.
Money. Lots and lots of money.
They can make that with single player games too. They're just lazy and want to make money with zero effort.
The last part, you nailed it! You can make a lot of money with a lot of effort and money put into making single player games ooooooor you can make a shitload of money with a lot less effort for a long period of time.
Lots of companies recognize how prestigious the latter option is. Sony is trying to balance both options.
They showed a graphic that explains that there are like 8 LS games on PlayStation that is making 50% of all revenue on PlayStation and the other 50% is made by thousands and thousands of other games. It would be corporate malpractice for Sony to not pursue LS games.
I hate it, but:
PS Plus!
The more live service games, the more people are at least confronted with the always recurring question of wether continuing their PS Plus subscription or not.
I really, really hate it.
Just look at Helldivers 2 and how Playstation players are treated differently than PC players. You pay 40 bucks for the game. But you can't even play it without another 70 bucks every 12 months.
I really, really wonder how there still haven't been any lawsuits yet how it is possible to treat console gamers and PC gamers so differently by law.
Just all new ones.
Yeah lesson learned, next time they'll waste 400 million to chase fortnite trend instead of hero shooter trend
Stop making live services
Make another wipeout game you cowards!
A new WipEout game would be bittersweet, given that's another studio that got shut down/sacrificed on the altar of a publisher's whims (PS Vita), rather than playing it safe and making a standard console game for an established market. Such a shame too, because every WipEout game they made was excellent.
Concord will be at least known forever as a game with some of the most terrible character design choices.
Regarding Marathon, it's already going to be very challenging to deliver a niche type of game without any solo mode for most gamer. The only gamers I know who are exited about it have played escape from tarkov.
...says the company that offered PS3 for $599 and PS5 Pro for $699. Must be a different mistake then.
They haven't identified the problem and they won't will. They are still searching for a formula and think they just have to refine it looking at successes and failures. But that will not help them. The formulaic approach is the culprit in the first place. It leads to decisions made not because it fits the game or an holistic artistic vision, but just based on: this other game did that and was successful. Drop the formulaic approach. Identify good artistic minded people and give them the creative freedom to make games. Think Hideo Kojima. Death Stranding is everything but following a formula. It may be hard to find these people, so make a lot of smaller games to test out your potentials. And the ones doing well, give them bigger projects to work on.
They had a State of Play and did not show or mention the game that is supposed to come out this September. Marathon is dead.
No mention of Fairgames($) either. Clearly there is some touching grass going on at PS.
Why punish firewalk studios,
The stupid higher ups from Sony should lose their jobs for pushing gaas bullshit in the first place
You know that Concord was being developed before the studio was bought by Sony, right?
...and this, ladies and gentlemen, is the risk using AI as your creative engine. Coke chased Pepsi and we got Coke2; Sony chased Fortnite and we got...this.
Notwithstanding their own flaws and falls along the way, companies like Apple and Nintendo show how when you risk new ideas and filling gaps, you end up leading the market for a season.
I'm not saying that Concord was developed by AI, but doesn't it show?
