Sony Believes Concord Failed Because of an Overly Competitive Market

Although it might feel like it only happened yesterday, nearly a year has passed since the launch – and quick shutdown – of Concord, a game that even legacy media outlets – typically no strangers to running defense for AAA studios – agree marked one of the largest failures in video game history, with its name surviving only as a pejorative for catastrophic flops: "a failure of concordian proportions," "to get concorded," and on they go.

Recently, the notorious dud was dragged back from its grave and into the spotlight by Sony's Business Group CEO Hermen Hulst, who spoke about the studio's live-service titles and the lessons they learned from Concord's blunders, stressing that Sony is determined to ensure they're "not gonna make the same mistakes" with Marathon.

But to treat disease, one must understand disease, and based on Hulst's remarks, that understanding may be lacking. Speaking at the G&NS Segment Fireside Chat, the CEO claimed that what "ultimately" sank Concord was its release into "a hyper-competitive segment of the market" and its failure to stand out enough to grab the community's attention – conveniently sidestepping the game's two biggest issues: its unappealing character designs and the $40 price tag.

What makes Hulst's comments more interesting is the context, as Concord was brought up first and foremost to bolster confidence in Bungie's upcoming extraction shooter Marathon, which he described as a "very bold, very innovative, and deeply engaging title."

Given that Marathon, similar to Concord, has already drawn criticism for bland, generic characters and for not being free-to-play, the claim that Sony is aiming to avoid past mistakes rings hollow, with Hulst's statement coming off less like a genuine reflection on the reasons that tanked Concord and more like a pitch to investors who may not be fully aware of the gaming community's opinion on both of those games.

The CEO's statement also sounds odd in light of an earlier rumor that Sony has canceled all paid marketing plans for Marathon, which, if true, would suggest that no one is more uncertain about the game right now than its own publisher.

Whether the rumor is true or not, it seems to matter little for Marathon's chances of success, as both the game and its developer have recently been dragged into a swamp of controversy – ranging from reports of toxicity within the studio and a growing divide between developers and executives, to Bungie's fourth art theft scandal – which nigh-eliminated all goodwill and hype the game had.

That, combined with Forbes' recent report describing the studio as being in "free-fall" and warning that they "absolutely cannot afford" for Marathon to flop, has done serious damage to community trust in the game, and with Sony refusing to openly acknowledge Concord's biggest blunders, or at least fix them quietly behind the scenes, it feels that the remnants of that trust have now been eroded even further.

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