The first game revealed at PlayStation’s State of Play was Concord, a new 5v5 first-person shooter set in the Concord Galaxy, developed by Firewalk Studios. Players will become part of the North Star once they log into the game. The North Star is a group of mercenaries called Freegunners in the galaxy.
They roam the stars and take high-stakes jobs on worlds across wild space where they face other fiercely competitive Freegunner crews. Introducing the studio behind the game was Asad Qizilbash, head of products at PlayStation Studios and PlayStation Productions.
ALSO READ: Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown Gets September 12 Release Date After Several Delay
“I’m here to welcome one of the newest members of the PlayStation Studios family, Firewalk,” said Qizilbash. “This team brings together some of the most talented developers in our industry with an incredible pedigree in the online multiplayer space.”
There are around sixteen characters to choose from in Concord, and each character has a unique playstyle. The characters include Vale (sniper), Lennox (gunslinger), Haymar (crossbow), Star Child (shotgun), and 1-off (android).
Concord borrows elements from different games in the genre
There are already tons of PvP multiplayer games out there but Concord tries to set itself apart by borrowing elements from fighting and strategy games and leaning on the strengths of the game’s development crew.
“With Concord, we leaned on the strengths and background of our team to make a tight, well-balanced FPS that feels great to play,” said the studio’s design director, Josh Hamrick. “We focused a ton of our attention and our tech on building a strong gameplay foundation of tight core movement, precise and visceral shooting, and expressive abilities.”
ALSO READ: Why Is My Gaming Laptop So Slow? 5 Ways To Fix It!
In addition to the players’ abilities, Concord features deployable gears that can persist throughout a full game. According to the game’s lead character designer Jon Weisnewski, Concord will have multiple rounds of a mode and multiple respawns across a match.
“There are healing pads, bullet-blocking domes, explosive traps, flame-blocking walls, all kinds of ways to support your team or disrupt your enemies,” Weisnewski said. “Coordinated teams can set up and plan ahead. Depending on where and when it happens, players can shift the battlefield to their advantage.
Concord will feature new weekly cinematics
Live service game developers always look for ways to retain players after the first run. Firewalk Studios has announced what we believe is an innovative way of getting players to log into Concord every week.
Kim Kreines, director of IP at Firewalk Studios announced that Concord has everything from mystics and medics to gunslingers and sparked robots. However, what she said that caught our attention the most was that the game will feature weekly cinematics with new story arcs.
“Every week when you log into Concord, you will be welcomed with a new cinematic vignette that will give you a chance to see our characters off the job,” Kreines said. “they will feature ongoing narrative arcs that grow the character’s stories and relationships and unpack the broader Concord galaxy.”
Firewalk Studios will host a pre-launch Beta in July this year on PS5 and PC. The game is expected to launch globally on August 3, 2024.
Earlier this week, Sony held a business segment meeting where the company’s executives shared important updates on the company’s strategy. It said it will continue to release its tentpole games on console first while live service games will launch on console and PC.
ALSO READ: Opinion: Is Platform Exclusivity Still Relevant Or Has It Become Bane Of Great Games?
Helldivers 2 was Sony’s first-party title to launch on another platform outside the PlayStation console. It turned out to be a great hit. In the business segment meeting, Sony reiterated that the game had sold 12 million copies, 1 million more than Marvel’s Spider-Man 2.
Looking at those numbers, Firewalk Studios will likely be under pressure to achieve the same feat with Concord. We will be watching the numbers closely.
