Sony has issued takedown notices for videos showcasing a fan-led project that’s bringing doomed PlayStation live-service game Concord back to life.
PlayStation’s quickly-binned hero shooter Concord was one of the biggest flops in the compay’s history. Amid disastrously low player numbers, Sony pulled the game offline just two weeks after launch, with one estimate suggesting it sold just 25,000 copies. It proved a costly failure for Sony, with hundreds of millions of dollars wasted. Its developer, Firewalk Studios, closed shortly thereafter.
Despite its brief life, or perhaps because of it, Concord remains of interest — with a dedicated group of players dedicating “months” of work to getting the game back online again, reverse-engineering the code and using private servers to host online matches of Clash Point. And now, it seems, Sony has taken notice.
“After a long time of reverse engineering [and] server development, we just managed to play a match of Concord!” the team announced on Discord (thanks, The Game Post). “The project is still WIP, it’s playable, but buggy. Once our servers are fully set up, we’ll begin doing some private playtesting, if anyone here wants to join those playtests, let me know (include what region/time zone you are in for convenience).”
While the volunteer developers admitted the build could be “buggy,” the team managed to get the main menu, character select screen, and matchmaking working again, with one team member saying, “the project is still a [work in progress but] it’s playable.”
Around this time, volunteers began sharing videos and images of their project in action and posted them to YouTube. But news of the project gained traction, it also appears to have caught the eye of Sony, which has seemingly begun striking down the videos with copyright notices.
Fans behind the rebuilt game appear keen to make clear their attempt only provides server access to players who had legitimately bought the game, rather than anyone using or sharing “copyrighted files.” In a message on the fan project’s Discord: “I know this sucks for people who got forcefully refunded, but lawyers are most likely already watching everything we do and I want to ensure this project stays as legal as we realistically can do. We will be removing any posts containing links to copyrighted files.”
Despite this, however, the group leaders have now paused invitations, stating they had received “worrying legal action.”
In February 2022, Jim Ryan, then-PlayStation’s boss, announced that the company would launch more than 10 new live-service games by March 2026, and spent big on studio buyouts as part of the drive, bringing in Destiny developer Bungie, Jade Raymond’s Haven Studios (Raymond has since left the company), and the now-shuttered Firewalk Studios.
Since then, however, Sony has cancelled a slew of projects, including a live-service God of War title in development at Bluepoint, and another live-service title being made by Days Gone developer Bend. Firesprite also previously ditched a live-service Twisted Metal project, while Insomniac was known to have worked on a live-service co-op Spider-Man game titled The Great Web, and Naughty Dog’s live-service The Last of Us multiplayer effort was also ditched after years of work. And then there was Concord.
Now, however, Sony has reflected on its progress in transforming PlayStation into a company that runs a suite of successful live-service games, and the company’s chief financial officer, Lin Tao, acknowledged during Sony’s latest financial results briefing that the plan was “not entirely going smoothly.”
Vikki Blake is a reporter for IGN, as well as a critic, columnist, and consultant with 15+ years experience working with some of the world’s biggest gaming sites and publications. She’s also a Guardian, Spartan, Silent Hillian, Legend, and perpetually High Chaos. Find her at BlueSky.
