Concord may not be dead after all as game files update fueling free-to-play speculation

Concord is renowned as one of the biggest video game flops of all time, and is definitely Sony's biggest flop ever, with the title reportedly costing as much as $400 million to develop only to generated a few million upon release.

The failure of Concord is likely underestimated due to how quickly Sony decided to pull the game down after abysmal sales and reception. Moreover, the game was such a failure that Sony decided to refund everyone who purchased it, meaning Sony made exactly $0 from a multi-hundred-million investment. That begs the question: Will Concord and all of the content surrounding it just be thrown in the bin now? Or does Sony shelf it for the time being and re-release it as a free-to-play game?

The second theory is gaining some traction as it was discovered that Concord's developers, Firewalk Studios, are quietly updating the Steam games files, according to the title's Steam db listing. The activity was as recent as October 8, and while we can't decipher the changelog to see what was added/altered, the activity has fueled speculation Sony and Firewalk Studios are preparing for the free-to-play re-release of Concord.

Suppose the rumors are true and Concord did cost approximately $400 million to develop and release in the state we saw it. In that case, it makes sense that Sony will want to try and at least recoup some of their investment back through a free-to-play business model that likely involves a Battle Pass-type structure that features microtransactions in the form of cosmetics. However, it isn't as simple as simply deciding Concord is now free-to-play and re-releasing it.

Concord was originally developed without any free-to-play business models in mind, meaning the game has no infrastructure to support such a model, especially if Sony wants to lean heavily in that direction with countless microtransactionable cosmetics. Changing Concord into a free-to-play title will require some degree of development time, which means more money.

Sony has found itself between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand, they can shelve Concord, write the entire project off as a loss, and move on from the embarrassing release. On the other hand, they can try to recoup some of their investment by investing more money into making Concord a viable free-to-play title.

If I were to guess what Sony will decide, I believe Concord will eventually return as a free-to-play title with a fresh marketing campaign. This will most likely happen after the PS5 Pro has launched, as Sony will want to be able to display its new free-to-play arena shooter on its new PS5 Pro.