Has there been a more competitive time to release a video game?
After a physicist who helped launch the Hubble telescope told me he couldn’t make that work, I thought better of it.
Instead, then, we must go by vibes, and the vibe right now is it is a very competitive time to release a video game.
Or maybe more specifically, a live service video game.
The catch is these hits more often than not are live service games, and live service games require not only vast amounts of players but now also vast amounts of those players’ attention.
They’ve shifted from being a part of the entertainment economy – “Do I spend my spare £40 on a new video game, or on a couple of new albums?”
Now enter poor, eight-years-in-development, PlayStation first party exclusive, multiplayer shooter Concord, which somehow arrives in the market during the August of an infamously fallow year for video games feeling like an underdog.
There are new ideas here, despite early, trailer-based dismissals of Concord as a kind of derivative Guardians of the Galaxy clone.
Maybe. There hasn’t been a more competitive video game release period. It’s not really something you can measure without resorting to crude totals of sales and metascores and some sort of dividing by the interval between release dates. Mind you, there was a particularly rectangular part of my brain that was tempted to engage in the same kind of futile endeavor as designer Ed Beach of Civilization 7 when he attempted to quantitatively measure whether his team was adhering to Sid Meier’s rule of thirds. I changed my mind after learning that a physicist who worked on the Hubble telescope’s launch couldn’t make it work.
It is necessary to follow our instincts instead, and at the moment, it seems like there is intense competition for video game releases. Or perhaps a live-service video game would be more precise. For the elite of the gaming industry, this is just one of many major mysteries of the recent past. Big publishers, as we all know, want big profits, even at the risk of re-treading some already-trodden ground. To be more precise, they are looking for the same kind of massively popular, hobby-level, culturally significant profits that you would find in games like Grand Theft Auto, Pokémon Go, League of Legends, Fortnite, Warzone, Counter Strike, or even just a classic Wordle. The trouble is that these hits are almost always live service games, which demand enormous amounts of players’ attention in addition to a large number of players. They take time, yes, to make, but they also take time to play, and there’s only so much time in a day, as any contemporary human who is severely overworked will attest to.
This is, I believe, the reason why games have struggled so much in their attempts to “develop.”. They are now part of the engagement economy instead of the entertainment economy, asking questions like, “Do I spend my spare £40 on a new video game, or on a couple of new albums?” “Do I tick off some daily objectives in FC24 while listening to Spotify and talking with friends on Discord, or watch another episode of Star Wars while scrolling through Tiktok with intermittent breaks for Twitter/X, and my partner’s voice note about what I’m cooking for dinner?” instead.
It almost seems unnecessary to state aloud how obvious it is that all of this is. However, it also appears strangely unacknowledged that this is the reality we now live in and that everyone is aware that it is completely unsustainable, but no one seems to be able to put an end to it.
Above all, it is a nice game created by a team of people who sincerely believe in what they have created.
Enter Concord, the PlayStation first-party exclusive multiplayer shooter that has been in development for eight years and somehow finds its way onto the market in August of a year that is notorious for being a poor year for video games. (I realize that this year isn’t a fallow year for excellent video games—quite the contrary, which only makes matters worse—but by all of our conventional measures, it is a fallow year for massive, triple-A tentpole games. ( ).
Concord is doing just fine. I think it’s fine based on the few hours I used it for a preview earlier this summer and the additional hours I spent using it after its servers went live this week. A full review is on the way, hopefully going to be a little more forensic than that, though someone may disagree. Despite early trailer-based criticism of Concord as a sort of derivative Guardians of the Galaxy clone, there are new ideas here. The stacking crew bonus feature, for example, adds an intriguing twist to the idea of in-game progression that Firewalk’s developers borrowed from their experience with games such as League of Legends. It grants you a distinct buff for every character class you switch between throughout stages. It promotes both deliberate preparation for how you might rotate through the roster as the game goes on and spontaneous adaptation.
Not only is it fairly stylish, but it also features lovely synths, clean, minimalist menus, and 70s retro-futurism that’s almost entirely in style. For the curious, there is a dedicated lore bucket to rummage through. It features incredibly beautiful skyboxes with vibrant green hues reminiscent of the Hulk and vibrant red tones. The brisk and nimble multiplayer rounds occasionally have the rhythmic momentum of Destiny’s Crucible. Some weapons are fairly powerful, and Concord’s extensive character design places a great emphasis on being beginner-friendly. Some weapons are a little more basic in terms of mechanics and come with different types of homing missiles or bullets to help you get started, while others, like the standard revolver-slinger or sniper, demand actual skill. Furthermore, you won’t have to worry about free-to-play gimmicks like battle passes or treasure chests. Just like in the good old days, you pay for it upfront.
Strangely enough, though, that might be Concord’s undoing as well. The first questions Firewalk answered in a developer Q&A following that summer preview focused on how they planned to keep players engaged without using artificial engagement boosters like unlocking “surprise mechanics” or earning passes. To Firewalk’s credit—and maybe also to their demise—the explanation was that they had created a game that they thought would be enjoyable enough for players to want to play.
With all of this rather depressing and unnecessarily enthusiastic praising, Concord is only formally launched today. It might become another hit and surprise the doubters. It may be a hit, even though publisher Sony sort of lazily floated it out to the public at Gamescom, coinciding with the release of an open-world Star Wars and the massive Black Myth: Wukong, which is exclusive to the PlayStation console.
Sincerely, I’m hoping it rocks. Above all, it’s a generous game created by a group of people who sincerely believe in what they’ve created, at least based on a quick impression. However, just like a lot of other charming indie games with noble goals and various competing types of “content,” Concord’s turn has come to obediently go above and beyond. It moves from the trenches of development into the uncharted territory, grasping its weapon and unique ability, hoping for the best and preparing for what is likely to happen eventually, all the while the never-ending struggle for our attention continues.
