Concord: Being Fun Doesn't Cut It
Over this past weekend, I’ve put a fair bit of time into Playstation’s latest investment: Concord. I really should call it Playstation’s latest failure because any publicity this game receives is reporting on how much of a disastrous flop it has been. I won’t beat around the bush: It’s a failure and will serve as a grim reminder of this tumultuous time in gaming where publishers are continuously chasing an infinite bag of money that comes with a successful live service title.
I put maybe 15 hours and reached max rank in the beta weekends last month, and eventually caved and pre-ordered the game on the principle that the game was fun enough for me to fork out some money to keep playing it. Since the game launched I’ve played 25 hours (and over 100 matches) over the week which I think is a lot for me.
But as I sit here, after playing 15 matches in a row, relatively satisfied with myself, believing I just had a ton of fun… I get depressed… knowing that it’s CONCORD that I’m playing. There is a depressing aura to this game. I’m playing matches and can’t help but imagine I am but one of the 15 people playing this game. Not that there are many people to ask, but I wonder how many other people playing the game feel the same way?
But why… why Concord? Why did Sony choose this game to pursue, and why did nobody latch on to it? Why did this take 8 years…? Better yet, why did I spend money on this?! Okay, don’t answer that. The answer is because I wanted to play it. I have fun with the game; clearly, the 7 other people I play with agreed and swiped their cards. Whatever.
Honestly, there is a whole lot more wrong with the game than just, “The characters are ugly!” or “Nobody asked for this!” Nobody asks for anything. I didn’t ask for this game, but here I am playing it. Allow me to break down a little bit about how the game plays and the best and worst about it.
I like how the game feels: some characters have great feeling weapons and fun movement options. The studio comprises some former Destiny developers, and it shows in this game. For instance, Lennox, the character with a generic Hand Cannon and Dodge Reload is ripped straight from Destiny’s Hunter class. And it feels just as satisfying to use as it does in that game. Or Star Child, The lumbering Drax-type character with a satsifying shotgun who charges around the battlefield, knocking enemies up for a quick shotgun combo.
Unlike Overwatch, this game feels less like tug-of-war and more like COD deathmatch-style gameplay (with objectives sometimes). Most characters can hold their own in a 1 on 1 fight and need not rely on the skill of the other characters on the team to do well. Some characters are better at this than others, but I can say the game feels relatively balanced if everyone plays well to their strengths. Every character in this game is fun to play.
However, parts of the game feel unfinished. Some mechanics go underutilized and some modes aren’t being played. Players aren’t playing the objective and aren’t playing around each other. There is a poorly explained “crew” system in the game that it seems nobody knows about. It gives you buffs for switching characters mid-match, dependent on the role the character fills out. The problem is, you need to die first and then switch characters to get the buff. Matches don’t last long enough to reap the benefits, if you are doing very well you are not going to get your buffs. In the round-based modes without respawns, you cannot pick the same character in another round after you’ve won with them once, so thats where I see the mechanic get used more, perhaps by accident.
You can build your own crew, too. Essentially making a character select screen of your own, the game actually allows you to put up to 3 (!) of the same character on your roster, which just allows you to play the same character over and over again. You can even put 3 MORE on the roster if you have a variant of them! That’s 6 versions of the same character on the same roster in a mode where you’ll max out at 4 uses of a character.
You can see all the buffs on the left side. Do you think you would have noticed that immediately? And you do you think you'd understand why the buffs are being applied? And do you think you'd understand what the buffs actually do? "Increased mobility"? What does that mean-- what's increased and by how much?
I could discuss EVERY character in the game in more detail, including how some have useless mechanics or weapons—I have played so much of this game that I can do so. I could also talk about how truly TERRIBLE some players playing this game are. That goes hand-in-hand with the poorly explained modes and mechanics. I’ve had plenty of matches getting rolled over because the team doesn’t play together and players keep trying to 1v5.
For a game that costs $40, and one that practically brags about being upfront with its cost as an excuse to not be “predatory” with microtransactions, there sure is a whole lot LESS content than Overwatch which came out 8 years ago for the same price— and a whole plethora of baffling decisions that are made considerably worse after learning the game took 8 years to develop. How do you develop a PVP multiplayer shooter without implementing leaver penalties or backfilling? How did no focus testers point out the confusing Crew system? How did they only make 12 maps, some maps not even playable on all modes? How, how, in 8 years did every (16) character only get ONE (1) skin to customize with?? Everything else is a subtle recolor. Not even the “actual” skin gets its recolor. Some of these skins are good…
Some of the skins barely change anything...
And some skins are just straight up ugly...
But don’t worry! That’s the benefit of the $40 price tag! Pay us now, and we won’t stuff the game with a cash shop or a battlepass! Everything can be unlocked for free from the start! You own Concord, Concord doesn’t own you! But the only things to unlock are ugly ass skins that I don’t want to use and I won’t even see anyway. There are Variants (the same character with a different passive ability) in the game for each character to unlock— scratch that, only like half the roster has a variant, only unlocked from increasing your account level. You’d think you level up a character to unlock their variant, but that would be too obvious. Others are unlocked by doing a series of 5 different challenges that rotate out week by week. So much for Concord not “controlling” me. Now I gotta log in every week to unlock everything I paid for.
Here's one of the things you can customize your character with. Try to spot it. If you can't find it, it's the little trinket attached to her butt. I don't know if the developers noticed this, but the game is in a first person perspective. I am NEVER going to see that thing. Not that I'd ever want to.
I can totally understand why the general population didn’t buy into this game and it’s really depressing. The game is just so utterly sauceless. Nothing about the game jumps out as unique and nothing is appealing. I’m sitting here on the main menu, watching as this lifeless character stands there, shifting their eyes around the lifeless ship, waiting to queue into another lifeless match. When you get into a game, you’ll sit through a painful minute-long sequence of lifeless cutscenes and menus before you can finally play on the lifeless maps and modes, all while listening to the characters spout lifeless lines. If the game had a better understanding of how to look and act, it would come off better to bystanders on twitter or youtube, and they might have perceived the game a lot better.
Instead, what’s left over is a flat world that doesn’t look good to anyone. You can browse the extensive lore book in-game, but it's all for nothing. An entire world has been written for this game, all as a backdrop, each character has their motivations, and their backstories that give some life to them. Even the art within the lore guides makes these characters look better than they do in the game. None of this world is reflected in the game. The maps you play on have no personality, just generic factories or deserts filled with boxes and rocks all perfectly placed in a nice grid to ensure the maximum amount of balance. Nothing about this game jumps out to make it appealing.
Just sitting here.... me and this fucking guy...
So while I do enjoy the game, and I’ve played a fair bit, I can’t help but feel bad for this game. It’s been completely mismanaged. Despite being a fun romp, there's not enough for me to look forward to. Every time I’ve been on twitter, or youtube, or reddit, I see posts about Concord. I think maybe it’s secondhand embarrassment, but I hate seeing this constantly pointed and laughed at. I think it’s just regret settling in. I feel bad for everyone involved. This took 8 years to make. I hope some kind of divine intervention can pull this game out of the gutter, but it does not look likely. The only people left playing I have to imagine, are the ones trying to get the Platinum trophy. Nobody will be playing this game in a month's time. Sometimes being simply fun just doesn't cut it anymore.