PlayStation is continuing to focus on developing live service titles, despite the failure of Concord.
PlayStation has had a pretty up and down year, to put it mildly. Third-party titles like Stellar Blade, Rise of the Ronin, and Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth propped up the PS5 early in the year, as did the enormous success of Helldivers 2, which has become one of the most successful live service titles this year. Then Concord happened.
Concord not only failed, but failed spectacularly, and was pulled from storefronts after less than a month. It was extremely expensive, and a talented studio in Firewalk was completely shut down as a result, so you’d assume that PlayStation would potentially want to cool its jets on live service to avoid another cataclysmic failure. Apparently, Concord wasn’t enough to sway the company from its current course.
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In a new interview in Famitsu (translated by InsiderGaming), PlayStation co-CEO Herman Hulst has recommitted to focusing on live service titles for the foreseeable future. In the interview, Hulst claims that people are still itching for “great entertainment experiences” but admits there is more competition nowadays.
“One thing that remains constant is people’s desire for great entertainment experiences, and attention to games continues to grow,” says Hulst. “However, this has also created competition, and like many companies in the industry, we have had to make changes to our business to solidify a more sustainable operating base.”
Hulst then says that PlayStation will “continue to focus on developing live service titles along with the story-driven single-player titles that our players want”, suggesting that the current plan of action is largely unchanged, Concord be damned. That’s rather surprising given the scale of the game’s failure, but it seems as though PlayStation is using Helldivers 2 as somewhat of an excuse to keep going.
Helldivers 2 Has Convinced PlayStation To Keep Focusing On Live Service
Hulst goes on to explain exactly why PlayStation is maintaining its course with live service titles, and he may as well have just pulled up Helldivers 2’s player count and sales right then and there.
“We are learning a lot as we establish the ability to develop high-quality live service titles within SIE,” says Hulst. “Helldivers 2 attracted many players through continuous content provision, and achieved results that support the potential of live service titles.”
Concord may have been a complete bomb, but PlayStation has seemingly been able to sweep it under the rug since Helldivers 2 was massively successful. There’s no doubt PlayStation was hoping Concord would be successful, especially with appearances in Amazon’s Secret Level, but I’m sure it will feel its live service plans are justified if it can get at least one to blow up every year.
