Concord sales ceasing immediately, offering refunds to all customers. The game will be taken offline beginning Sept 6th. (Check staff post)

[Legio XIV Gemina]

Or maybe the game wasnt good overall. And people did not care to buy. You cant force people to buy a product that does not get their attetention and blame ccu for it.

Wether anybody likes it or not, CCU is "one" of the aspects that defines the success of a game. And it is here to stay and people are going to discuss about it in almost every single game. Games from publishers that have a big push obviously are gonna have much more attention. So removing the discussion of ccu and blame a game's failure is just not correct imo.

Blame the game's failure on its short coming, unappealing and problems that have in its desing. Failure cannot be blamed on people who didnt like the game and then argue that discussions about ccu made it die.

 

[Igniz12]

The fact that Sony heavily featured Marvel Rivals at Concord's State of Play baffled me to no end.
Sony showed off a 40 dollar hero shooter with a cinematic trailer that was desperately trying to ape Guardians of the Galaxy.
Then ten minutes later Sony advertised a f2p hero shooter with actual Marvel characters that was much more visually appealing and looked more fun to play.

Everything about Concord's development and marketing confuses me.

Click to shrink...

Feels like another case of "line goes up" symptom. Sure we need our game to look good cause it makes us and our brand look good but can't pass up the marketing dough and a hot new game from a killer IP even if it competes with our game cause it grows our platfrom vs the competition. But instead what ended up happening was Concord maybe ended up wiping out the money they got to promote MRivals and leaving them with a confidence hit that gonna be felt for a while.

Maybe it could also be arrogant Sony™ thinking they could carry two big shooters in a showcase and it would not have hurt their own game but that only works if Concord was a good game or something people were even remotely excited about.

Every scenario you posit kinda falls apart when the game was something no one cared about, or wanted.

 

[SCUMMbag]

But the playerbase was actually abysmall. This is how massive flop this was.

Click to shrink...

I agree. The cost effective thing was absolutely to shut the game down.

But also, the people who were likely playing Concord were Sony fans who bought the game because they generally enjoy and vibe with whatever PlayStation studios puts out. So when you pull the plug, you're jettisoning those players back into communities where they're looking for someone to blame and really, because they're so invested in a brand they're more likely to blame external factors than anything related to Sony or the game itself.

I think more people would have come to conclusion that Concord isn't it had they had the ability to play it over a long period of time and fell off naturally.

 

[Sir Lucan]

The fact that Sony heavily featured Marvel Rivals at Concord's State of Play baffled me to no end.
Sony showed off a 40 dollar hero shooter with a cinematic trailer that was desperately trying to ape Guardians of the Galaxy.
Then ten minutes later Sony advertised a f2p hero shooter with actual Marvel characters that was much more visually appealing and looked more fun to play.

Everything about Concord's development and marketing confuses me.

Click to shrink...

I thought about that too. Sony wants the biggest GaaS on their platform featured heavily, while simultaneously creating their own and competing with them. So they are literally creating competition for their own games. It's a weird strategy.

 

[FuzzyWuzzy]

It is kinda wild to me that the discussion has now moved on to CCUs being easily available as the culprit of Concord's demise.

Yes, obviously everyone knowing the game bombed does not help it, but I struggle to see it having a significant impact when the game had no hype, no word of mouth or anything else going for it. People that did play the game dropped off fast, the open beta did not convince people that played it to buy in (me included), streamers dipped as soon as the paid period was over etc.

 

[oni-link]

It is kinda wild to me that the discussion has now moved on to CCUs being easily available as the culprit of Concord's demise.

Yes, obviously everyone knowing the game bombed does not help it, but I struggle to see it having a significant impact when the game had no hype, no word of mouth or anything else going for it. People that did play the game dropped off fast, the open beta did not convince people that played it to buy in (me included), streamers dipped as soon as the paid period was over etc.

Click to shrink...

The second the CCU numbers are revealed to be that bad, the games already circling the drain

If it only sold 25-50k copies and people are already dropping off after a week, it's never going to pick up enough players in week 2 and beyond to make it worth maintaining the servers and working on future content/seasons

Maybe there were a few hundred players who were thinking about picking the game up but held off after seeing the CCU numbers, sure, but when a game is already in that state a few hundred people wouldn't change the tide

 

[BloodHound]

Everyone isn't going to end up refunded, but after all the refunds they do send are sent Sony is going to make basically zero dollars off this game and its budget was bigger than a game like Devil's Third could ever dream of getting.

It's the biggest bomb in video game history and it's almost impossible to manage anything topping it.

Click to shrink...

Hyenas also cost 9 figures and was cancelled before launch.

Crucible probably cost more than both and made no money as well.

So "almost impossible" anything topping it is a hot take.

 

[FuzzyWuzzy]

The second the CCU numbers are revealed to be that bad, the games already circling the drain

If it only sold 25-50k copies and people are already dropping off after a week, it's never going to pick up enough players in week 2 and beyond to make it worth maintaining the servers and working on future content/seasons

Maybe there were a few hundred players who were thinking about picking the game up but held off after seeing the CCU numbers, sure, but when a game is already in that state a few hundred people wouldn't change the tide

Click to shrink...

Yep, with CCUs in the hundreds the game has already bombed and as you say, the few hundred people waiting for the numbers would not right the ship

 

[Yeeboh]

The idea that unbelievably low CCUs made nobody buy the game is incredible, it's like arguing that clocks make it be nighttime

Click to shrink...

It sure is a take.

 

[Uzzy]

Look Steam CCUs and Twitch Viewing Figures are basically the two provable metrics we have to see if a game is doing well or not. They're far from the whole story, of course, but any other data we get is filtered by the publishers who'll obviously not share bad information unless they're legally compelled to (shareholder calls and the like.)

So it's inevitable they get latched onto.

 

[AstralSphere]

Look Steam CCUs and Twitch Viewing Figures are basically the two provable metrics we have to see if a game is doing well or not. They're far from the whole story, of course, but any other data we get is filtered by the publishers who'll obviously not share bad information unless they're legally compelled to (shareholder calls and the like.)

So it's inevitable they get latched onto.

Click to shrink...

It's also important info to people when making buying decisions considering its a paid game.

Its info that not only will be discussed, it needs to be discussed. If I'm looking at buying a multiplayer only online title I'm for damn sure going to want to know what the player base is looking like and I'm going to search for that info wherever it is.

I'm seeing people argue over whether valuable consumer info should be discussed because of the impact it would have on their buying decision. Like... what? At what point do we draw the line here? Do we avoid all review score discussion because we are concerned that a 40 Metascore game might get low sales?

 

[BloodHound]

The CCU stuff is fascinating for Sony's next GaaS titles

If I was interested in Fairgames Dollar Sign then based on how Concord has gone I would 100% be waiting for the CCU figures before buying the game (assuming it's a paid game and not free to play) as if the game launches with a terrible CCU count then I wouldn't get it, as why buy a game that Sony will probably (based on Concord) haul out back and shoot in the head after a few weeks?

If anything, if I were Sony I would scrap the idea of releasing any paid service games for a while, especially if like with Concord and Fairgames Dollar Sign, 100% of the impressions pre launch are "this looks bad" or "who is this for"

Fairgames Dollar Sign hasn't shown gameplay yet, so maybe that game can win people over with a gameplay trailer, but if it's gameplay trailer falls flat then I'd be shitting myself if I were Sony

Click to shrink...

Or Sony can have an alpha and a couple betas for folks to try way before launch to incorporate feedback like every other live service that isn't shadow dropped.

This year alone folks played 2xko, Fragpunk, marvel rivals and deadlock months before their launches.

You'll know community sentiment for Fairgame$ way before any official launch so your concern is unfounded.

 

[Sir Lucan]

The idea that unbelievably low CCUs made nobody buy the game is incredible, it's like arguing that clocks make it be nighttime

Click to shrink...

There's a really weird defense force for this game that will blame anything they can for why it failed instead of the game itself.

 

[Kiekura]

I agree. The cost effective thing was absolutely to shut the game down.

But also, the people who were likely playing Concord were Sony fans who bought the game because they generally enjoy and vibe with whatever PlayStation studios puts out. So when you pull the plug, you're jettisoning those players back into communities where they're looking for someone to blame and really, because they're so invested in a brand they're more likely to blame external factors than anything related to Sony or the game itself.

I think more people would have come to conclusion that Concord isn't it had they had the ability to play it over a long period of time and fell off naturally.

Click to shrink...

Nah. I think Sonys only win with Concord was them shutting it down fast and refunding people their money.

 

[Daphne]

Wow. I have to admit, I know nothing about this game except its name and a vague impression it's some multiplayer Overwatch type thing?
But it always sucks to see a game fail, and so resoundingly. I hope the devs will be okay.

Crazy times in the industry. Sometimes it feels like there's simply too many games and they crowd each other out but I'm probably just getting old.

 

[AstralSphere]

Or Sony can have an alpha and a couple betas for folks to try way before launch to incorporate feedback like every other live service that isn't shadow dropped.

This year alone folks played 2xko, Fragpunk, marvel rivals and deadlock months before their launches.

You'll know community sentiment for Fairgame$ way before any official launch so your concern is unfounded.

Click to shrink...

If only Concord had a beta before its launch, maybe make it available for an entire weekend a whole month before launch, and allow every PS Plus subscriber (aka everyone who can even play the game) to give it a go.

That would surely have helped it.

Oh...

 

[PlanetSmasher]

If only Concord had a beta before its launch, maybe make it available for an entire weekend a whole month before launch, and allow every PS Plus subscriber (aka everyone who can even play the game) to give it a go.

That would surely have helped it.

Oh...

Click to shrink...

Wasn't one of the betas not even on PC at all? That was real dumb.

 

[AstralSphere]

Wasn't one of the betas not even on PC at all? That was real dumb.

Click to shrink...

Yeah I'll grant you that. Not having it accessible on PC was stupid.

 

[Cocolina]

If only Concord had a beta before its launch, maybe make it available for an entire weekend a whole month before launch, and allow every PS Plus subscriber (aka everyone who can even play the game) to give it a go.

That would surely have helped it.

Oh...

Click to shrink...

it's clear the beta was part of the marketing more than it was about any actual product testing

 

[ghostcrew]

Wasn't one of the betas not even on PC at all? That was real dumb.

Click to shrink...

Pretty sure both beta weekends were available on PC, as well as PS5.

The only real difference is that PC players had to pre-order to get access to the first closed beta, whereas PS5 players got access with PS+.

Open beta was free and open to both platforms.

 

[AstralSphere]

Pretty sure both beta weekends were available on PC, as well as PS5.

The only real difference is that PC players had to pre-order to get access to the first closed beta, whereas PS5 players got access with PS+.

Open beta was free and open to both platforms.

Click to shrink...

I didn't even realise there was an open beta.

 

[OtakuCoder]

Look Steam CCUs and Twitch Viewing Figures are basically the two provable metrics we have to see if a game is doing well or not. They're far from the whole story, of course, but any other data we get is filtered by the publishers who'll obviously not share bad information unless they're legally compelled to (shareholder calls and the like.)

So it's inevitable they get latched onto.

Click to shrink...

Yep. The only way to stop CCU discourse would be not having that data available. Definitely a case of the cure being worse than the disease.

 

[Alvis]

Game: *sells badly*
Person A: Look, this game is selling badly
Person B: FUCK YOU!!! IT'S YOUR FAULT THAT IT'S SELLING BADLY!

wut

 

[Linus815]

this ccu discourse is funny. Its like people still have no grasp on how much of a flop this was. Even with double the player base this wouldve been closed the exact same date most likely. People didnt care in the first place, not just after steam numbers were plastered over the internet.

 

[oni-link]

this ccu discourse is funny. Its like people still have no grasp on how much of a flop this was. Even with double the player base this wouldve been closed the exact same date most likely. People didnt care in the first place, not just after steam numbers were plastered over the internet.

Click to shrink...

Even if the CCU on day 1 was 15x what it was, it would still be 3,000 under the peak of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, which was also a massive flop that wasn't played by enough people to generate a profit or justify more support/content

The scale of the bomb is what is truly incredible

 

[FarronFox]

I didn't even realise there was an open beta.

Click to shrink...

Either did I. I wanted to try it before release but when I looked it up it seemed the beta was only available to those who pre ordered. This is all on pc I'm talking about. I don't pay subscriptions to play online, so wasn't trying it on ps5.

 

[Adulfzen]

so for some people the solution would have been tricking users into purchasing a game with a low amount of players by not making the CCU publicly available ?

It's pretty clear that the latter resulted into the game becoming a punching bag but I seriously doubt it'd have prevented the game from being a complete failure sales wise, maybe the game would have lasted a month instead ?

 

[southwest]

Genuinely can't believe people are still blaming the CCU for this failing if that's what I'm reading. The CCU is only that low because it has already failed.

 

[Xshade90]

The CCU is not the problem. The marketing was. Nobody, and I mean this, nobody in my circle of even professional developers and gamers friends were aware this game existed, and they are a lot. Sony's marketing for this game was abysymall. Maybe here on Era it was existing because of all the backlash and all, but Era is mostly a bubble you can't trust in term of product viability.

 

[AmFreak]

Genuinely can't believe people are still blaming the CCU for this failing if that's what I'm reading. The CCU is only that low because it has already failed.

Click to shrink...

One look at all the data available and everyone can immediately see why it bombed (not a good game).
At the same time i have never seen anything close to this level of spin for a no name 62% mc game.
It's like we have reached a whole new level of fanboyism.

 

[Polk]

Either did I. I wanted to try it before release but when I looked it up it seemed the beta was only available to those who pre ordered. This is all on pc I'm talking about. I don't pay subscriptions to play online, so wasn't trying it on ps5.

Click to shrink...

I don't think it would help much because less people played open beta then closed one so even paying cusomers didn't return for second round.

 

[shadowman16]

Genuinely can't believe people are still blaming the CCU for this failing if that's what I'm reading. The CCU is only that low because it has already failed.

Click to shrink...

Yeah. CCU didnt cause the game not to sell. We had a closed and open beta before that which flopped hard - unless people are gonna seriously suggest that those pesky CCU numbers were doing damage back then... Maybe its that people just didnt like what they saw, so they didnt even try playing it for free, and those that did play it... well a number of those didnt like it either, so didnt buy it. So only a small number enjoyed it, and brought it.

Streamers streamed the game, but that did little to raise interest also, you could see the lack of interest here as well...

All in all. People just werent interested. Happens all the time with games. Some just aint hits. This isnt some weird conspiracy against the game that's been orchestrating some grand plan to force the game to fail, this is just a game that people didnt care/werent interested in. It sold accordingly (badly) and was closed (at a record pace). The fact Sony yanked it almost immediately suggested it must have been a catestrophic bomb... suggesting that pretty much everyone either rejected it, or just ignored it.

 

[RockmanBN]

Is it now time to shift the blame to the streamers or should we have the reviewers take responsibility for the game not performing well?
/s

 

[Xando]

Genuinely can't believe people are still blaming the CCU for this failing if that's what I'm reading. The CCU is only that low because it has already failed.

Click to shrink...

There is this group of people on era that will use any excuse to avoid talking about the fact that the vast majority of people saw concord and thought it was a unattractive mid tier game that didn't have a hook.

 

[Jazar]

No one is saying the game would have done well without CCU discourse. No one is advocating the hiding of CCU for players. No defenses need to be made if people want to shit on the character design, marketing, world design, game modes, quirky player death power ups, or more. The reason why it failed was multi-determined. I brought up CCU because the discourse has an effect. CCU numbers were published on news sites, blogs, vlogs, threads on this forum and others since the first beta weekend. It's an interesting subject to talk about, NOT a patsy to excuse the overall quality. Removing such a high profile game this fast not due to any technical reason but because of sales is an unprecedented event and as far as I'm concerned all facets are fair game.

 

[southwest]

No one is saying the game would have done well without CCU discourse. No one is advocating the hiding of CCU for players. No defenses need to be made if people want to shit on the character design, marketing, world design, game modes, quirky player death power ups, or more. The reason why it failed was multi-determined. I brought up CCU because the discourse has an effect. CCU numbers were published on news sites, blogs, vlogs, threads on this forum and others since the first beta weekend. It's an interesting subject to talk about, NOT a patsy to excuse the overall quality. Removing such a high profile game this fast not due to any technical reason but because of sales is an unprecedented event and as far as I'm concerned all facets are fair game.

Click to shrink...

The CCU discourse has an absolutely minuscule effect. I'd even go as far to say no effect at all. The game failed before CCU was available. Be that beta or release. CCU and the ensuing discourse is just an indicator of the games failings

 

[Aiii]

No one is saying the game would have done well without CCU discourse. No one is advocating the hiding of CCU for players. No defenses need to be made if people want to shit on the character design, marketing, world design, game modes, quirky player death power ups, or more. The reason why it failed was multi-determined. I brought up CCU because the discourse has an effect. CCU numbers were published on news sites, blogs, vlogs, threads on this forum and others since the first beta weekend. It's an interesting subject to talk about, NOT a patsy to excuse the overall quality. Removing such a high profile game this fast not due to any technical reason but because of sales is an unprecedented event and as far as I'm concerned all facets are fair game.

Click to shrink...

You'd have a point if the numbers were generally good, and just a bit on the low side and people went ham on the game because of it. You see, a new game, especially from a big publisher, generally gets thousands, more likely tens of thousands of players on the first day or two.

This game got a few hundred. And those few hundred did not enjoy the game. So it quickly became a few dozen.

Those aren't "oh but the discourse made it worse" numbers. Those are "nobody ever had any interest in picking this game up" numbers.

 

[MidweekCoyote]

I have mostly been a passive observer of the whole thing but out of curiosity went to the Twitch category on the last day before it was shut down. I expected it would at least go out with a bit of a bang, like both streamers and viewers milking the game in the last 24h before it's "gone forever". The category on that last day barely passed 700 viewers when I watched.

I was utterly baffled.

 

[Vareon]

It's possible to say "the negative CCU news had a negligible effect to overall playerbase" without resorting to absolutism like "nobody ever". Having some nuance in discussion is recommended.

 

[Aiii]

It's possible to say "the negative CCU news had a negligible effect to overall playerbase" without resorting to absolutism like "nobody ever". Having some nuance in discussion is recommended.

Click to shrink...

Or just read contextually and understand when a hyperbolic statement is being used to emphasise a point.

 

[AstralSphere]

No one is saying the game would have done well without CCU discourse. No one is advocating the hiding of CCU for players. No defenses need to be made if people want to shit on the character design, marketing, world design, game modes, quirky player death power ups, or more. The reason why it failed was multi-determined. I brought up CCU because the discourse has an effect. CCU numbers were published on news sites, blogs, vlogs, threads on this forum and others since the first beta weekend. It's an interesting subject to talk about, NOT a patsy to excuse the overall quality. Removing such a high profile game this fast not due to any technical reason but because of sales is an unprecedented event and as far as I'm concerned all facets are fair game.

Click to shrink...

The game had failed before those numbers even surfaced. This isn't a game that hit those numbers months later, it was literal days with a game estimated to have sold 25k copies, a figure that even you multiplied it by 20x it would still be deemed a catastrophic failure. The CCU discussion is a complete non-issue, and the difference it made is likely so miniscule it's utterly absurd it's being brought up at all.

 

[Arkanim94]

Almost like saying that Morbius failed because people memed it to death.

 

[Aiqops]

Yeah sorry defense force. Complaining about ccu being visible and killing the game you loved is getting hilarious at this point.

 

[texhnolyze]

Those whining about Steam CCU, should also ask Sony to bring these whole pages down since the writings were already on the wall before CCU numbers surfaced. Concord had never made it to the front page.

Best Sellers | Official PlayStation™Store US

Pre-orders | Official PlayStation™Store US

 

[stormfire]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFjOfNrBNEw
All this effort gone to waste.

 

[ACDStorm]

The CCU is not the problem. The marketing was. Nobody, and I mean this, nobody in my circle of even professional developers and gamers friends were aware this game existed, and they are a lot. Sony's marketing for this game was abysymall. Maybe here on Era it was existing because of all the backlash and all, but Era is mostly a bubble you can't trust in term of product viability.

Click to shrink...

Better marketing may have captured a few more sales but it would have also meant millions more wasted on Concord and as I explained earlier the more people found out about Concord the more they understood the game wasn't for them, just look how quickly it lost the few dedicated players who actually bought the game, look how streamers lost viewership when streaming the game. No amount of marketing can fix the fundamental issues with the game.

Apex legends, one of the biggest successes in this category launched with zero marketing.

 

[senj]

Is it now time to shift the blame to the streamers or should we have the reviewers take responsibility for the game not performing well?
/s

Click to shrink...

The defence force already decided that it's Jeff Gerstmann's fault for putting his thoughts about the game in a patreon post without playing it as much as they think he should have, which makes him an Unprofessional Reviewer

 

[Bizazedo]

The CCU is not the problem. The marketing was. Nobody, and I mean this, nobody in my circle of even professional developers and gamers friends were aware this game existed, and they are a lot. Sony's marketing for this game was abysymall. Maybe here on Era it was existing because of all the backlash and all, but Era is mostly a bubble you can't trust in term of product viability.

Click to shrink...

I mean, the game showed up on the Playstation dash multiple times, including a free Beta to everyone with PS+. That means your circle of professional developers and gamer friends didn't have PS+ / didn't turn the dash on / have those ads turned off.

Sony was literally throwing the game everywhere on my dash, including those animated shorts for the game.

This is also ignoring the State of Play seen by millions.

Sony messed up a lot with this game, but it was out there.

 

[oni-link]

The defence force already decided that it's Jeff Gerstmann's fault for putting his thoughts about the game in a patreon post without playing it as much as they think he should have, which makes him an Unprofessional Reviewer

Click to shrink...

So far the below parties have all been blamed for killing the game in this thread:

- Jeff Gerstmann
- The Chuds
- The gaming media
- The OP of the CCU thread
- ResetERA dot com
- The games marketing team
- Steam, for allowing CCU stats to be public

Never before has a game had the odds so thoroughly stacked against it

 

[AstralSphere]

The defence force already decided that it's Jeff Gerstmann's fault for putting his thoughts about the game in a patreon post without playing it as much as they think he should have, which makes him an Unprofessional Reviewer

Click to shrink...

Does this mean I can blame IGN for God Hand not selling more?