I think we can all agree that Concord was a disaster for PlayStation. Its launch was met with a lukewarm reception, and player numbers were so low that after just a week, PlayStation stopped selling it entirely and refunded everyone who bought it.
Now, amid reports that the game director is resigning and the studio is in “difficulty,” some new information has surfaced that makes Concord’s situation even worse.
The news was announced by Sacred Symbols’ Colin Moriarty, who posted a nine-minute clip from the latest episode of Sacred Symbols on his X account. Moriarty previously worked as a reporter at IGN and broke many stories during his tenure, but now typically doesn’t break stories unless someone reaches out to him with information, which is the case here.
According to Colin, staff at Concord contacted him and shared inside information. Colin claimed to have verified his identity, his position and apparently had extensive conversations with him. Towards the end of the clip, he described the source as “totally reliable,” which is why he was confident in the information presented to him.
“The reason I want to talk about this is because some of the assumptions I made about this game were just plain wrong, both in terms of how much it cost and how much Sony really lost on this game,” Colin said.
“So the big thing you really need to know,” Colin said on the latest episode of Sacred Symbols, “is that Concorde cost about $400 million to build.”
Towards the end of the clip, Colin confirmed that the massive figure did not include the actual cost of purchasing the studio.
“Concord will basically enter alpha status in the first quarter of 2023. This is before Sony acquires the team, but Sony has been working with ProbsibleMonsters (the original owners of Firewalk), and Firewalk may start in late 2020, or at the latest early 2021. Concord, Colin explained, before saying that about $200 million has been spent on the game so far.
“It’s unclear how much of that funding came from MaybeMonsters and the original investors, and how much came from Sony,” Colin said.
However, between season one and launch, Colin’s sources claim Sony spent an additional $200 million on the game, giving us a mind-boggling $400 million figure.
“The buzz behind Concord was that the game was in a ridiculous state when it came out,” Colin said.
“The game was in such bad shape that Sony felt they needed to spend that much money again – $200 million plus $200 million – to get the game to MVP status, rather than make it a great game. Game to get it.
The MVP status Colin mentioned stands for “Minimum Viable Product,” a term used in business to describe the point at which a product reaches the minimum level that developers can safely sell.
Colin went on to say that much of the additional $200 million came from having to outsource work to other studios to complete the game. This includes two aspects of the game that haven’t been done at all before being showcased in alpha: onboarding and monetization.
Colin said that as far as he knows, he believes Concord is Sony’s most expensive game to date. Of course, this is purely based on a $400 development budget, of which Sony’s proportion is unknown. Colin noted that we know The Last of Us 2 will cost around $220 million, and briefly mentioned that Spider-Man 3 is supposedly a very expensive game, costing around $350 million. For context, Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 had a budget of approximately $315 million.
Based on those numbers, Concord is indeed technically Sony’s most expensive game to date.
“The question is why, why did this happen?” Colin said on the podcast. “There’s a lot of support behind the scenes for this game.
Colin went on to explain that the story is strange because the game launched in the first quarter of 2023, was unfinished and was “in a bad place,” but that’s when Sony decided to acquire the studio.
“The idea behind this, and obviously the terminology verbatim, was to say ‘Concord is the future of PlayStation,'” Colin said.
“They had such ambitions for the game that it was being referred to internally as a Star Wars-like project at Sony, to the point where it could be revisited over and over again, not only across media but also Of what we’ve seen. We’ve seen some of that, so they’re releasing story segments every week, and of course, Amazon’s Secret Levels anthology, that’s just scratching the surface of it.
“…There’s a toxic positive vibe. Apparently, you’re not allowed to talk about anything internally about the game, like what’s wrong with it, the character design isn’t right, etc. Obviously, this is Herman Helst The kid who is, deep down, a great champion of the sport.
Colin ends the clip by commenting that Concord is Sony’s most expensive game to date and the company’s biggest failure.
“I mean it could have cost nine figures, like $100 million. But I don’t think it could have cost $200 million. In fact, it cost $400 million — and that doesn’t include the cost of acquiring the team! Colin was shocked call.
As with any anonymous source, this information must be taken with a grain of salt, although I will say that Colin Moriarty is generally good at vetting his sources and making sure they are at least legitimate. Of course, anything they say is probably gibberish.
But the information Colin gathered was supported by others. Kotaku’s Ethan Gach tweeted: “I can confirm the part about toxic positivity. Some sources I’ve spoken to attribute it to the studio’s stubborn mentality stemming from Bungie.
Gage said he will have more information next week.
