Worst case scenario for Firewalk: studio closes after "Concord" debacle

It is the worst-case scenario for Firewalk Studios: after the unsuccessful launch of the hero shooter "Concord", the US studio is being closed, Sony has announced. This means that the online shooter "Concord" will not be returning to –, leaving it with an unprecedentedly short lifespan of two weeks.

"Concord" was launched at the end of August after years of development. But nobody wanted to play it: There were only a few hundred people online on Steam even at peak times, a debacle for online games of this size. Sony shut the game down again just two weeks after the launch.

No restart of "Concord"

Nevertheless, there was still hope that Sony would give Firewalk time to develop the game further and switch to a pure Free2Play model. Nothing will come of it. "We have spent a lot of time over the last few months reviewing all our options," writes Playstation CEO Hermen Hulst in an internal letter published by Sony.

"After careful consideration, we have come to the conclusion that the best course of action is to permanently discontinue the game and close the studio," writes Hulst. "I would like to thank everyone at Firewalk for their craftsmanship, creative spirit and dedication."

A competitive market

Hulst rightly notes in the letter that the market for such live-service shooters is highly competitive: In addition to top dog "Fortnite", Riot Games with "Valorant", Blizzard with "Overwatch 2" and Valve with "Deadlock" are also fighting for players' time. Because such games eat up a lot of time, the target group is usually unable to actively follow more than one or two titles. Amazon's "Crucible", which was also shut down a few months after its release, has already shown that it is difficult to break through with a hero shooter.

However, the case of "Concord" and Firewalk Studios is even more remarkable – partly because Sony only bought the studio last year. The fact that a game with such a high profile and years of development was only playable for two weeks is nothing less than an embarrassment for Sony.

In addition to Firewalk, Sony also wants to close the Neon Koi studio, which had offices in Berlin and Finland. Neon Koi was bought by Sony in 2022 as Savage Game Studios and was supposed to develop mobile games for Sony's well-known brands, but has never announced a game. According to Bloomberg, 210 people will lose their jobs as a result of the studio closures: 172 at Firewalk, 38 at Neon Koi.

(dahe)