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All games deserve preservation. Large emphasis on GAMES. That filthy garbage ain't a game it's political sludge. Being a game was never the point. It's like selling a golf-kart or tractor as a car
I feel like we're in this weird era where a lot of the execs in too many corporations are making their decisions purely on the basis of vibes. Sony with Live Service, Square Enix with Crypto, NFTs and AI, Hasbro with everything it has been doing with Magic and DnD. These people fundamentally do not understand the industry their corporations are in, they fundamentally do not understand their products, their customers/audiences, nor do they seem to understand business itself.
if i was sony here's 3 games i'd bring back Syphon Filter, to fill the stealth action genre void MAG to fill the PVP action shooter market SOCOM to also fill the PVP market I might be more into SP games but there is merit to what Sony did with Socom and MAG....and MAG deserves to return....it was cut short and never really hit it's potential at least that's what many say....Socom also deserves to return cus it was a well loved title by many!
If ever there was a group of people that needed to go out and "touch grass" it is pretty much everyone in any corporate media. Especially Sony that even turn wins like Helldivers into losses.
@travisolander4749no this is totally not true. Just recently Wukong released and broke everything we knew. Even Sony had a banger with helldivers 2 this year. I would approve OP and would say execs have no clue what makes good games and therefore are reliant on trend analysts or consultants. None of these actually help you understand what makes a good game
When what went up in smoke? You do realize that not only has Helldivers 2 been highly successful selling 12 million a game they actually own. BUT spend ZERO dollars on development of Concord..... Concord was started in 2016 by independent studio Fire Walk Studio. The game was finished in 2022 but Fire Walk studio did not have a publisher.....Sony acquired Fire Walk Studio in late 2023 after the game was already finished......LMFAO Sony lost zero dollars on Concord. It was more than likely what Fire Walk asked for in return for allowing Sony to acquire the studio.
It went up in smoke last year with the Bungie house of cards crashing down in a Light Fall shaped pile. Jim was announced to be leaving just a few months after that. Helldivers 2 like concord got very little marketing, then after arrowhead drove that game into the ground all the president had to say was Bungie needed to get their shit together. You’ve been living under a rock or an alternative reality if you think only now is Sony rethinking live service.
200M+ is 4 different 50M dollar smaller games. that's the main problem.. we could've gotten "AA" budget smaller games that would've probably sold better. Sony has a ton of IP that would fit this.
they should give SOCOM a chance and actually expand on what it had because i remember the franchise not really trying to do things differently it was the same every new entry with some small additions and eventually stagnated and died
@@chilbiyito During the PS3 era Sony had multiple Shooter games and actively competed in the multiplayer space. While also having solid Single player offerings.. as much as people praise the PS4.. the PS4 is what killed Playstation "as we knew it"
Concord isn't just an embarrassing failure, it's an embarrassing _high profile_ failure. It's going to be interesting to look over and scrutinize. At the same time, it's kind of refreshing to see people collectively just say "No" to something that was clearly eight years too late.
@@Weretaz I thought that Redfall bashing was just media bias, it was not. that game was cheap looking with awful controls and poor AI. Yet it managed to get 10x times the player count on steam while most people played it on the Xbox app with game pass and Arkane still managed to leave the game in a playable state before shutting down, also added 60fps and offline single player. Sony just went ahead and tried to erase Concord's existence. The internet will never forget though.
@@Weretaz Even if SS limps on for a year it isn't going to see a profit if estimates are even close. They would have to release more things just to keep the few numbers they have during that time. It is an endless pit at this point. The only thing to say for Sony is the knew to cut their losses.
Finally for once, the community came together and gave it a middle finger and said no thanks. Wish we’ve done this sooner to other titles, Diablo 4, cod since black ops 2, Madden and fifa etc
@@lucasLSD God don't remind me. And people wonder why we don't have bloodborne on PC. The people in Sony responsible for all of their amazing Eastern games are gone. Not only will we not get Bloodborne, but we'll probably never get another game in that vain because Western Playstation isn't going to collaborate with Fromsoftware on anything.
@@simpson6700 This is why there really isn't a big Japanese development presence on the Playstation anymore. They've almost abandoned the JP market entirely. It's pretty sad honestly.
"the best thing here is if good videogames comes out" - And that is why we need to apply the stick, the stick and only the stick. We have tried telling them politely. Telling them harshly. Not saying anything if there is nothing good to say, and so on. They have refused to listen to anything but the stick. It is only when the stick comes out and come down hard and without mercy they care. They do not care about you, and we should not care about them. If you want good games. Apply stick until moral improves. It is the only way they listen.
Yep, carrot is "buying the game and giving faint praise" but they don't care about what you say only that you give them money The only thing that affects catripleAAApitalism is refusing to give them money or attention and instead donating all that resource to real independent games
"PlayStation does not have the entrenched audience who will buy their things sight unseen that they clearly thought they did." Spot on. Sony fancies itself the Apple of the gaming industry - it is not.
My favorite thing is the $40 argument. No one played the FREE open beta lol. This game was an 8 year failure before it even released to the wild. Bungie better take heed for Marathon. They already have terrible history of launching games.
I have no idea what the free beta was even for if they just did nothing in response to it. They should’ve delayed the game and made it free to play next year sometime, even though it would’ve tanked either way.
@@bencarlson4300 Firewalk studios: "Dearest beta testers, we hear your advice and it's all been very good" Testers: "So with all that in mind, are you going to make the changes we suggested?" FireWalk Studios: "We're-" Sony: "I'ma stop you right there, you're not allowed to do any of that"
@@scottbyers9258 I knew the beta was out and free but never gave it a go because I was never gonna pay 40 for this game. If it was free I might have played during the beta
What flops are you talking about? I do know the bad reception concord is having but I have not been too keen on sony. I am just happy to see a reason for companies to stop with the live service trend. I was very active back when every company wanted to have their own call of duty, now not so much.
You missed what I think was the biggest killer for this game. Sony COMPLETELY missing the point when it comes to their target audience. Their big selling point was the "premium experience", "just look at these beautiful cinematics"... Which is BEYOND moronic, since the type of people who play Overwatch are the people who can barely tolerate loading screens. They want to push the "start" button and start blasting instantly, they have ZERO interest in cinematics that get in the way between them and the game they want to play. I think this, more than anything else, is what killed Concord. They completely failed at basic market research and failed to understand the desires of their target audience!
@@lareolanKFP You have a good point. Sony’s incredible production values that help sell their single-player games, don’t carry any weight in the live-service arena. Those players don’t care at all. If Sony wants to focus on live-service, the company needs to keep the productions smaller so they can be released more quickly and as free-to-play titles.
@@bizmonkey007i like Valorants route. Just have the cinematic on RUclips. Or maybe they can have single player or multiplayer story mode for casual playing with cinematics. I don't actually know what Sony ended up doing but I am guessing it wasn't anything like that.
I partially agree, but partially don't. I don't think Condord was trying to be Overwatch, but 8 years too late. I think they were trying to be Team Fortress 2, but 17 years too late. Team Fortress 2's cinematics and source film maker videos are a huge part of their marketing. A ton of TF2 players enjoy these videos, and it helps the game appeal to new audiences; it's how I found the game. TF2 has stupid and wacky and characters with a load of clichés, and concord was obviously trying to do the same thing. While TF2's graphics are heavily stylised, they were also very technically impressive by 2007 standards, when the game first came out.
That's true. We care about FPS. Many put the game on low settings to get more frames to perform better. Game looks ugly as sin when you do that, but you get more frames.
Its wild how these companies have streamlined making games so much that they forgot that theyre supposed to be innovative and creative. 2000-2015 was seriously a golden age and we had no idea. During those years the industry had the money to make awesome games but not the greed quite yet
The greed was always there, EA and Activision's reputations were made during that era. What changed, is they moved their internal hiring practices/reward structures away from meritocracy and towards demographic based. Higher prioritization of smaller talent pools, results in statistical losses in efficiency and production. On top of that they created new c-suit level departments empowered with censors veto.
@@walczak9862 "Streamlined." I would argue the opposite, the games industry has too much bloat. Too many CEOs, board members, stockholders that have a lack of vision for a game, more of a vision for profits and selling to the lowest common denominator. I guarantee all these games that have been made had passion in the concept phase that have been all scrubbed out due to "risk" and "palatability" for the "modern audiences." Meanwhile they throw millions of dollars at the devs and let them cook with nothing for close to 10 years or 1-2 years and wonder why they lost money. I wouldn't be surprised if Concord had way more interesting designs in concept art than what we got.
@walczak9862 haven't streamlined enough if dev cycles are almost a decade. Trends change too quickly these days to hitch a ride on trends that will be over by the time the game releases. Just make something fundamentally good and have a good eye for design, hire good talent. If the game gets the big stuff right genre doesn't matter as much, it WILL find an audience.
@@tehbeernerd I'd agree, but only for AAA games. Indie and AA are still pumping out gems every now and then, but AAA studios are creatively bankrupt now. I'm actually struggling to think of a AAA game I liked that came out in the last 5 years.
There's barely anybody left to run the brand Japan-side. Jim Ryan laid off most of the people working at Japan Studio when he closed it down. The only remnant of Japan Studio? Team ASOBI.
@@aquapendulum Playstation has mostly ALWAYS been western studios rather in NA or Europe with few studios in Japan.. I am saying the MAIN Company Sony of Japan needs to take back over calling the shots..
@@PhotonBeast who has squat running the brand. Sony of America does atm and it used to be Sony of Japan before the mid generation of PS4... Sony of Japan needs to take the reins back from Sony of America but leave the studios as is. Sony of America is driving it into the ground
14:14 I am sick and tired of live services; these aren't games but live services. I am sick of live services. Give us games we can play offline, not require PSN, etc, etc. We succeed when live services die.
And while we're at it, give me back my two-player games. I want to play side by side with a friend or a family member - sport, race, shoot, whatever, trash talk and have loads of fun together.
Shut up and buy the next cod or destiny 3. I am sarcastic. I am with you, but that's what we get until every company implodes and then it takes years to make new games to turn it around. You have to experience trash for 6 more years
To be fair even with the game being live service it could have still thrived if it were free to play. Who’s paying $40 for this when Overwatch is free?
Indies have already buried AAA companies like Sony, don't worry. There is an unseen wave right now with Godot engine, and it will be felt within the next 3 years, as the games currently developed in it, release.
We are oversaturated on Live-service shooters. How many options do we need? ... All these companies trying to get on the same bandwagon without any thought for market capacity.
@@lucasLSD CoD got on the bandwagon with DMZ. Also that failed Hazard Zone from 2042. And Delta Force will also have an extraction shooter whenever that releases
@@sqentontheslime1967 This year I played FF VII Rebirth, P3R, Trails Through Daybreak and Stellar Blade, so far. Edit, I just started my first playthrough of Control
Photorealism is technically impressive. But the problem is that most real people are kinda ugly, not to mention adding in random shit like lizard skin. The character design just ends up looking kinda creepy somehow, and not in the good, horror-game kind of way.
@@dontworry1302in the future the games will literally just be movies were the only interactivity is the pause button but still have to pay 70 dollars for
$40 was a problem? How many people signed up for the free Open beta to try the game out? If no one wants it for free, then no one would want to pay for it. This is like Opening a Resturaunt, got no customers because of the bad food, and blame everything other than the Chef who cooked the dishes.
It's the cover cope for the obvious failure of the game. Concord was mocked the second it was revealed. BEFORE the price was announced. BEFORE the maps were analyzed. BEFORE the game speed was revealed to be sluggish. But can't let the publishers think that DEI is the problem, so gotta blame SOMETHING. Worst part is, I'd LOVE to buy Marvel Rivals with Concord's monetization. So much more ethical and fair. But these... cultists... would rather throw gamers under the bus telling publishers we want to get nickel and dimed in "free-to-play" games than admit their agenda is the problem. Ghouls.
Helldivers is a PVE Co-Op game, a genre that's mostly underserved, such so that people are still playing Left 4 Dead. That's why people were willing to buy it. PvP games are almost all F2P, Fairgame$ going F2P will not hurt the premium perception of Sony. If Blizzard isn't too good for F2P, Sony shouldn't be either.
@admiralalyssa favorite gear moments was horde in river or security and using boomer shields for a makeshift barricade while someone called the sniper/torque bow spawn to kill specials
@@burnttoast26if the new gears is good I actually buy an Xbox for it. That's how much childhood memories I have with it. Playing it with all my friends back then.
The fact that they artificially block people from buying their games released in 2024 if they are not living at the right place on the planet certainly doesn't help. This is true for all their 2024 games except Horizon for some obscure reason, and all the older (2023 and older) of their Steam catalog you can buy and play no problem.
Yeah, I initially wondered how much the Helldivers PSN account issue would affect this. Folks were loving that game and then Sony applied the PSN requirement to negative backlash; folks surely remember a few months back and I'm betting a lot got cold feet knowing the same thing would happen here.
Sony's doing the whole PSN BS so they have numbers to con shareholders with. It's all analytics to continue their money flow and company value in an effort to endlessly grow. But paying into it is a guaranteed hack waiting to happen
@@SpottedHaresit takes years to make games. That's why we still get trash because they were started 6 years ago You think they have 90% of a product and won't release it? We will get shit for at least the next 2-3 years until the good projects are done.
It’s interesting you say that AAA games have become a big risk. I’ve been saying that for a little while now, but yet the studios still persist in trying to get that Fortnite-type hit. If a company is losing time and money on a business model that is far from a guaranteed profit, and they’re still doggedly pursuing that model, then it follows that they’re doing it for a different reason. These companies want a captive audience and they’re willing to burn hundreds of millions of dollars for that opportunity.
I think that is wrong though. It isn't the amount of money that is the problem it is the people approving and using that money that is the problem. For instance Concord even with less money would still be a flop, because the people behind it are. The AAA games that have been massive failures in more recent years always care about the actual game last. Can always stand up Hogwarts Legacy or Baldur's Gate 3 as the perfect recent proof of it works when they care to make a game people will enjoy first.
If a successful live service game makes 500 million a year and you spend 100k in 8 years, it is no surprise that they throw darts on the wall to hope 1 sticks.
@@ThePdeHav the ratio is irrelevant. You should ask how much they loose versus how much they gain if they hit a live service game. If they make 500 million per year at success and loose 100 million in 8 years they can make 4 games per 8 years until they have a success. It's just how much money the company has to try again. That's why big corporations like Activision /mihoyo/Microsoft don't give a shit when they make trash. That's why Sony is crumbling right now because they don't have that kind of money to spare. In the end the consumer is at fault because they buy it and we see what happens if nobody buys trash. But slap a cod title on it and it would have made millions or even billions and would be successful. Black ops 6 is trash and it still will break their last biggest earning quartal.
Bruh. This entire industry gets SO much feedback from their customers. Way, way, way more than any other industry. Aside from Hollywood, perhaps. Like...everyone is telling them what they want. Literally! They need to pay attention. There's no excuse for being this out of touch. Zero.
@@micheljolicoeur6094 It's so sad to watch Bungie hollow out Destiny, their cash cow, and pour it all into Marathon, trend-chasing live-service game that's already years late to the trend. It will absolutely sink the studio. Destiny was so much fun while it lasted.
Bellular: "Sony is acting in a reasonably premium and good way. They're definitely retaining their brand image." Also Bellular one minute later: "As much as we can sit here and laugh at Sony's expense..."
Those arent from people. Those are the copies Store outlets bought. Walmart, Target, Gamestop, etc. THEY are the ones Sony is refunding. Not those tools stupid enough to pay money for this garbage
I feel like we're at a point where if it's *always* risky, then why not try to make something unique and shoot for the fences instead of riding what will be a decade old trend by the time you're done?
Live-service is a trap. As Yahtzee once said, you can't make a game that wants you to spend all your time and money on it, when people already play a few of those.
Beautifully said. I'm starting to think, they believe that sunken cost only applies to gamers when it comes to their product, never other games that gamers have been playing for years and that they'll just jump ship because of some nice trailers on youtube. They only jump ship if the monetization has become so predatory or the general enshitification has become so bad that the threshold of cost of movement to cost of staying has been stepped over.
The most ironic part is that the game itself doesn't even look very photo-realistic. Just set a screenshot of concord gameplay alongside a screenshot of hell divers 2 gameplay - In pretty much every shot helldivers makes concord look cartoonish by comparison. They poured everything into making the cinematic look good, when they should have been focusing on what would make the game itself look better.
oh yeah because their version of "realism" is just making the player models look like regular people in cheap cosplay, completely ignoring color materials and lighting, even 10 year old games with decent lighting engines look better than this slop lmaoo
Most corporate boards have figured out they can make loads of money for themselves from exploiting ESG investment, and that's what's happening in all of these various industries where they have stopped caring about sales.
Doctor: well Jim, I see no reason why your game can't live another 10 years although he will be bleeding players from both ends..... Concord: eh, I'll die okay I'll just die.... Stony: hold up, we have the technology to save him....
@@Mr.Genesis There's one. "Hyenas". It had a beta, and so few people were interested in it that it was killed days before it was going to launch. It was completely finished and never even came out. AAAA, they called it.
I still can’t believe that gollum, a game not a soul thought would be good, a game that is a travesty on multiple levels, managed to out perform concord is wild, feels like even if they re work this game and re release free to play, they will just have another morbius on their hands where a good beating comes in twos
i know right, i didnt think the bar could get any lower but now i cant wait to see which future game release beats concords achievement of worse opening reception in the history of gaming. lol Its becoming so often that this type of thing is happening its starting to become its very own sitcom 😄
If memory serves, its stated that the in universe game sword art online sold around 10,000 copies, so in that fictional world, a massively popular success is less than half of a real world catastrophic faliure
Now's a good time to mention that AAA developers are crazy. Whole games fail not because they're bad, but because they don't make back the money (plus interest) on their obnoxiously high budgets. All while they crunch the developers or otherwise refuse to give them enough time to make a good game. Its ridiculous.
@@steak5599 For what? Concord? You do realize I was speaking on the industry as a whole, right? So to say "your point is ridiculous because this one game had 8 years of development" is ridiculous. What about all the other games that suffered crunch?
Let us never forget that SAO would have been a terrible game even if it wasn't killing people. Bosses that die only once, only one real role for everyone(DPS), players getting UNIQUE abilities that nobody else can ever get (congrats, you've just guaranteed a thriving account trade), a terrible UI of menus in menus like a matryoshka doll of pain And yes, if SAO happened in real life, 10,000 units sold would kill not only the game, but maybe the concept of VR MMOs for decades, as well as, most likely, the Nerve Gear itself.
A damaging aspect of these games (like foamstars) going free to play is that people now EXPECT games to go free to play after a while. Concord wasn't worth playing, and I doubt it could have been saved by being free, but I wonder how many potential players were sitting waiting for it to become free because so many of these games end up that way.
This is definitive proof that Playstation console players are not "de facto" purchasers and players of *Every* Playstation title The fact that the same top 5 live service titles haven't budged on the PS5 proves that. The entirety of the industry, players, and the media propped sony up as this "Can do no wrong" publisher and this console generation has shed light on how false that narrative actually is.
@krspaceT1 It doesn't help that Sony makes very little attempts at challenging Nintendo's stranglehold on the family market. Not every kid wants to, is interested, or can afford to play the types of games Playstation offers.
@@krspaceT1Astro Bot is a step in the right direction, however much of Playstation's "Mainstream" players are the type that shove a game like that off into "its a kids game" never land.. and never touch it because its not hyper-realistic
even watching concord gameplay feels like i need to put the video to 2x speed to get the normal movement speed of similar games. if watching it already feels so slow, how bad is it even when you play it?
Sony dropped the ball so hard by not releasing a Twisted Metal live service game yet. At the peek of battle Royals was the time and they still haven’t even made one.
I think you guys overestimate how many people would play a game like this for the long term as live service.maybr I am wrong but it sounds boring after 1 month. Could have profited from the TV show that was rather successful and would have made enough money to stay online I guess. But that's why corporations don't make those games. They dont want 20% more money in return. They want Fortnite or genshin money. Making them 100+millions per month.
@@majorshepard2 did you see destruction all stars? That’s something I think they would have to expand into twisted metal. After your vehicle was destroyed, you would be on foot as a person. If they made a good map that permitted fun gameplay as a person out of the car alongside the twisted metal traditional gameplay, I believe it could be successful. I hear you though, but I wouldn’t doubt that it would’ve been more successful than Concord and destruction all stars. It’s just insane that that IP has been dormant for years and the first form of media we get for that is a half ass show. I personally did not care for the show even though I’m a fan. I would’ve been better suited to just be graphic as hell/way over the top.
@@JgorinacI should have clarified. I loved twisted metal back in the days. I would definitely play a new game if it's good. Like you suggest the franchise needs new ideas to spice it up. I am just not confident in thinking that the Devs nowadays can bring a game like this to the next level to make it lucrative enough for a studio to produce. That's the sad part, that so many old games were so damn good that would deserve a new game or remake, but they just crunch the numbers and deem it as not worth it. Because they can't strike gold with it. It's a shame that every game has to make 10+ times their expenses nowadays so we will never see these types of games again. Odworld comes to my mind when I think of great games and never get a new title
04:36 regarding the "poor marketing" I didn't even know concord existed until i started hearing news about how it bombed. Not that I would have played it even if I new it existed for a variety of reasons.
Marketing for games I find do not work at all unless it's a beloved entry like halo 3s release. Marketing is supposed to get you more hyped. Unless you search out the trailer, are you really paying attention to their RUclips ad that intruded on your video for the fourth time in 40 mins?
Making a live service game is like putting a few million dollars into a slot machine, then giving it a pull to see if it works, and then claiming "you have a buisness model"
I love that they’re coping so hard that they’re blaming it on the $40 game price. Meanwhile the most common unit you see in First Descendant’s starting are is Ultimate Bunny. This CHARACTER is a $100 btw.
I'm waiting for axe to fall for fd worried about neon's choices in the game in regard to monetization. Devs are great and pretty open though. The price on bunny ult is related to price of biggest bundle prime access from warframe (better deal) their bundles r 60 for accessories plus 60 dollars in premium, 80 for frame/ weapons including slots and reacters for all of them and premium currency doubled from 60. And 100 for both combined (aseccories are generally inaccessible after access except for prime resurgence which is a new thing
@@Eyran84 Popularity don't represent quality. I've seem many comments saying First Descendant has "good design" if compared to Concord, that's nonsense, both are equally ridiculous. Every week there's new hentai games on steam, this crap is popular and there's a audience for it
dont forget to subtract the developer head count from the player numbers, because you know for sure they were leaving their accounts logged in just to not be at 0 players
you mention payday 3 as if that's got a chance at being good, not to anger the devs, but the choices made early on from corporate standpoints tanked the hell out of that game.
@@matthewoconnor2742 dont forget all the "influencers"/Yters they shipped the game to, to try garner some hype lol... it wouldnt actually suprise me if all their active players they currently have arent playing on a gifted version of the game.
Im pretty happy to watch AAA Games fall apart. Maybe when q big company falls under we will get back to the glory days of the early 2000's. Excited to see gaming rise back from the ashes of the last decade.
Sony assumed Nintendo like brand loyalty. Which they don't have for many reasons. Even that isn’t one to one, many Metroid fans don't play Mario and many more Mario fans don't play Metroid. You have more crossover than if they weren't Nintendo games but that is thatvway for many reasons. The stereotype about Nintendo fans only buying Nintendo is not built on nothing. Sony assuming a game succeeds based on being Sony doesn’t work with their reality. 1st party attach rates aren’t anything close. Add to ot marketing issues and you get a disaster. And expecting PC to make up the slack failed even more on top of it
The live service market is oversaturated, people can only reasonably have a few of those that they play on a regular basis because they require constant attention, and it hasn't done anything groundbreaking to grab interest. With such an oversaturated and competitive market there's no way something just 'okay' is going to work, especially not with a $40 price tag for entry.
Why Sony when they started with this plan didn't start with games that were already successful on their previous consoles. Fat Princess, MAG, Warhawk would had better choices of games to rebuild for modern hardware and bring back a playerbase.
Why is it every Gen between Xbox and PS they switch to "no, im the biggest idiot" meme... One face plant one Gen the other capitalize then when they are on top the face plant the next gen and it continues from there.
i dont think triple AAA games are risky, i think its risky always betting on the safe option and the betting on what people say they want, we need old school rockstar and valve back
any gamer could tell you, with those characters, it would fail.. ... new live service IPs can take off, LOOK AT THE FIRST DESCENDANT.., WHAT'S THE BIGGEST DIFFERENCE ON FIRST GLANCE?? THE CHARACTERS!
Honestly I'd barely even heard of Concord... then again I'm very much an old school single player experience gamer myself, I play very, very little multiplayer stuff . The last big multiplayer shooter game I put any significant time into was Overwatch before we learned the absolute toxic dumpster fire Blizzard had become.
This is all on Jim Ryan and his lack of understanding why live service games are popular as well as being years late to the party. There is a reason why he was told to resign right before all these came out. The writing was on the wall. They went from 12 games down to 6 and that was decided 2 years ago so who knows if the rest will even release. Fairgame$ (lol dumb name) will suffer the same exact fate of Concord if released. Jim Ryan fucked this generation of playstation. It's why it doesn't feel like there are many exclusive/current gen games... his focus was mainly on live service bullshit. I will give him a sliver of credit for wanting to get some new games for in between their big releases from the likes of naughty dog and sucker punch and blue point, etc, since games are now taking almost triple the length to develop as they did in the PS2/PS3 era. Phil Spencer is doing the exact same thing to xbox but in a different way by gobbling up all these third party studios to try and get exclusives for their failing platform (console wise). It was such a bad decision financially that they are now not only releasing those third party games they bought to be exclusive (lol) on other consoles as well as their own first party titles. It is a bad time for gaming overall even with great releases sprinkled throughout like Black Myth: Wukong. It's terrible for gamers, it's terrible for devs, it's not good for anyone, not even for the execs, suits, and shareholders. Ming boggingly how the industry got so far down this incorrect path. Raytracing, realistic graphics, micro-transactions, etc. My personal take is to bring the industry to modern PS2/XBOX 360/PS3 era with smaller titles like Black Myth: Wukong and Helldivers 2 and Palworld and Lies of P and AstroBot, and others. As a gamer who started on and has been gaming ever since the first Playstation console released, I was always excited for the new consoles to be able to make the games I'm playing now (mainly PS2/PS3 games) much more in-depth with vast improvements to npc AI and gameplay but instead it's tried to constantly keep up with the hardware with raytracing and realistic graphics as a priority vs innovative gameplay. I just hope something changes in the industry and we see better games and less layoffs.
There's only so much space for multiplayer games to be successful that's especially true of live service games. I like the look of First Descendants but I already have Warframe and I'm not interested in spending hundreds or thousands of hours in any other game. I imagine many other people are in a similar position.
Live service games are not popular, there just happen to be popular games that are live service. The fact they don't get that is one of the things against them.
@LilFeralGangrel the best thing about first decendent that not many games capture are the massive boss fights vs collosus (shooter against a massive boss)
@@Notnownev Yes, but counterpoint : depth of gameplay is harder to put as a line going up for bored old investors whose main gaming experience are slot machines in casinos, than polygon count.
devs were touting the first black trans character hours before the game died. The problem isnt there being a black trans character, its that these devs and publishers think its a key selling point, and then berate you when you don't open your wallet for them. This was generic ESG funded corpo slop out of the gate, so I certainly wasnt paying for idpol nonsense like that. I also don't understand why so many commentators are hesitant to even name this- its not voldemort, you can say it. Its obviously not the only factor or even the biggest but its significant enough to sour a large chunk of potential customers. You can sit there and say "oh well stop injecting culture war into this-" no no, look at these devs, everything they do is deliberate and with the intention of injecting the very nonsense you refuse to talk about.
I do feel bad for the animators and people who designed some of the visual fidelity for concord, because aspects of the game are absolutely beautiful. Those cutscenes are pretty dope too. Just seems like they missed the mark HARD on so many other design choices.
Imagine if this slop made the money back. We'd be in so much worse space in that alternative reality, where AAA could do everything wrong and get away with it even on 1st game in new IP. In our reality they recently could have done 2-3 games wrong on established IP before profits crashed, but it seems audience is waking up to the problem. Playtime of older but better games remains high. Next Total War, next CoD, next whatever still has big advantage but its not printing money regardless of quality.
The issue with these types of games is, there are a finite number of gamers that play these types of games. MANY of these gamers already have years or decades invested in other games like this. To get these players to want to start over, the game has to offer them something they aren't getting what they are currently playing. It's a huge time investment and unless the game is knocking their socks off and giving them exactly what they want they just aren't going to play it.
The second Sony since their live service cap plans a while back now, I had a vision that precisely matched what’s happened with Concord. Me, and everyone else, I reckon.
Tired of live service. Never liked it. I work 10 hour days (sometimes 12s) and the last thing I want to do when I get on a game in my free time is do a bunch of boring tedious daily missions to earn points to work towards some random skin or consumable. I just want to play a game and have fun. Fomo is a curse. Of course I want some cool limited time items. I just don't have the time or desire to "work" towards them. I don't mind unlockables that are a challenge to get, (secret weapons or outfits in games like dead space or resident evil) but I can work towards them at my own pace. They aren't going anywhere. Everything these companies do isn't for fun. It's to push people to spend money on premium currency, or buy extra levels in the season pass. It's despicable.
Marathon and especially Fairgames will most definitely bomb, too. Also, we do have a Nintendo Seal of Quality in 2024, it's the Nintendo brand on the cover. They only release bangers.
They also don't baloon budgets, understand marketing, and 'DEI' better. Last one is a spiteful joke aimed at those comments. But Nintendo fans lack those idiots compared to Sony
@@yet0another0account ....Since XY? Geeze, I have my gripes with the Switch games but that's a very harsh read. Honestly even Scarlet and Violet aren't that bad. I don't like Dexit, but having played hundreds of hours the graphical issues are really overstated. Also compulsive 'Game Freak is not Nintendo' spiel.
most of them sales are most likely gifted copies of the game to the devs, their co workers, family and friends lol The rest will be mostly gifted copies to influencers and their close friends ect considering thats the route they went down as for adversiting. Obviously there will a few "special-headed" individuals who had a smooth brain moment and purchased the game themselves but i dont believe that number is more than the current active player count.
From what I've heard, most people hated Concord's character designs more than anything. If they made the same game in Ratchet & Clank universe, LittleBigPlanet, or similar to playstation all-stars, we'd probably be singing it's praises. I wish they'd take 20% of what they put into this to resurrect one of their many dead franchises.
Let’s say this game was selling for $75.00 a copy (I know it’s closer to $40 a copy). At 25,000 copies sold that means they raked in $1,875,000. That is not bad for a game that cost an EXTREMELY conservative $100,000,000. I’m sure they’ll be just fine. It’s not like they completely and utterly fucked themselves trying to be politically correct while wantonly bashing the very consumer base that would’ve given them infinitely more success than the base they were pandering to. Yeah. They’ll be just fine.
I just hear that blizzards 120$ game releases is the future to go😏 maybe go up to 150 in 5 years, saying the new generation makes it so much more expensive while you have less employees because ai took over their work.
As someone who really doesn't care for this game on a conceptual level, but is utterly fully behind the Stop Killing Games initiative and game preservation, I do believe those 15-25k should be able to play this in the future. At least hopefully most people get their refund, unless they bought it from brick and motor and they tell them to shove. In which case, that's a real tragedy. 200+ mill down the drain. That could have gone to many smaller games with half to a quarter the dev time, not just one big better one. Shameful display, honestly.
They just need to make a couple characters female and make him look like they're from Black desert online and they'll have a better chance of getting more people to play
Marathon has a massive head start over both Concord and Fairgame$. It won't be DOA like Concord was. Whereas there's a decent chance that Fairgame$ is.
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Look on the bright side, hateful people have failed to push their nonsense. Hopefully that whole studio gets axed.
All games deserve preservation. Large emphasis on GAMES. That filthy garbage ain't a game it's political sludge. Being a game was never the point. It's like selling a golf-kart or tractor as a car
I feel like we're in this weird era where a lot of the execs in too many corporations are making their decisions purely on the basis of vibes. Sony with Live Service, Square Enix with Crypto, NFTs and AI, Hasbro with everything it has been doing with Magic and DnD.
These people fundamentally do not understand the industry their corporations are in, they fundamentally do not understand their products, their customers/audiences, nor do they seem to understand business itself.
if i was sony here's 3 games i'd bring back
Syphon Filter, to fill the stealth action genre void
MAG to fill the PVP action shooter market
SOCOM to also fill the PVP market
I might be more into SP games but there is merit to what Sony did with Socom and MAG....and MAG deserves to return....it was cut short and never really hit it's potential at least that's what many say....Socom also deserves to return cus it was a well loved title by many!
If ever there was a group of people that needed to go out and "touch grass" it is pretty much everyone in any corporate media. Especially Sony that even turn wins like Helldivers into losses.
It's almost like trend chasing doesn't work... huh
@TechnoSpice trends are like fads they go away. It's like starting a race a year behind when said race started
@travisolander4749no this is totally not true. Just recently Wukong released and broke everything we knew. Even Sony had a banger with helldivers 2 this year. I would approve OP and would say execs have no clue what makes good games and therefore are reliant on trend analysts or consultants. None of these actually help you understand what makes a good game
I am happy to see Jim Ryan's hopes for live service slop being the future of gaming going up in smoke.
When what went up in smoke? You do realize that not only has Helldivers 2 been highly successful selling 12 million a game they actually own. BUT spend ZERO dollars on development of Concord.....
Concord was started in 2016 by independent studio Fire Walk Studio. The game was finished in 2022 but Fire Walk studio did not have a publisher.....Sony acquired Fire Walk Studio in late 2023 after the game was already finished......LMFAO Sony lost zero dollars on Concord. It was more than likely what Fire Walk asked for in return for allowing Sony to acquire the studio.
@@lutherheggs451 there’s too many holes in this claim for it to make reasonable sense… and you’re awfully aggressive about this too?
It went up in smoke last year with the Bungie house of cards crashing down in a Light Fall shaped pile. Jim was announced to be leaving just a few months after that. Helldivers 2 like concord got very little marketing, then after arrowhead drove that game into the ground all the president had to say was Bungie needed to get their shit together.
You’ve been living under a rock or an alternative reality if you think only now is Sony rethinking live service.
That guy is Sony's Mattrick.
It's going to take more failures to turn the ship around. All we need to do is stop buying/playing live service trash
It's a shame that those 200 million haven't been spend on an actual good game. 😕
200M+ is 4 different 50M dollar smaller games. that's the main problem.. we could've gotten "AA" budget smaller games that would've probably sold better.
Sony has a ton of IP that would fit this.
they should give SOCOM a chance and actually expand on what it had because i remember the franchise not really trying to do things differently it was the same every new entry with some small additions and eventually stagnated and died
@@chilbiyito During the PS3 era Sony had multiple Shooter games and actively competed in the multiplayer space. While also having solid Single player offerings.. as much as people praise the PS4.. the PS4 is what killed Playstation "as we knew it"
Could've fed some starving people, paid for some cancer treatments, built some schools...
I'm still waiting for overlord 3 and HL3
Concord isn't just an embarrassing failure, it's an embarrassing _high profile_ failure. It's going to be interesting to look over and scrutinize.
At the same time, it's kind of refreshing to see people collectively just say "No" to something that was clearly eight years too late.
Even if it came out eight years ago it likely would have been seen as subpar.
suicide squad was terrible attempt at live service cashcow and redfall just sucked, but i wouldnt be surprised if those games managed to make profit
@@Weretaz I thought that Redfall bashing was just media bias, it was not. that game was cheap looking with awful controls and poor AI. Yet it managed to get 10x times the player count on steam while most people played it on the Xbox app with game pass and Arkane still managed to leave the game in a playable state before shutting down, also added 60fps and offline single player. Sony just went ahead and tried to erase Concord's existence. The internet will never forget though.
@@Weretaz Even if SS limps on for a year it isn't going to see a profit if estimates are even close. They would have to release more things just to keep the few numbers they have during that time. It is an endless pit at this point. The only thing to say for Sony is the knew to cut their losses.
Finally for once, the community came together and gave it a middle finger and said no thanks. Wish we’ve done this sooner to other titles, Diablo 4, cod since black ops 2, Madden and fifa etc
Japan Studio died for this, 200 million to sell less than Gravity Rush.
@@lucasLSD God don't remind me. And people wonder why we don't have bloodborne on PC. The people in Sony responsible for all of their amazing Eastern games are gone. Not only will we not get Bloodborne, but we'll probably never get another game in that vain because Western Playstation isn't going to collaborate with Fromsoftware on anything.
@@lucasLSD I would buy GR3 so fast that I would get whiplash 😮💨
Gravity Rush was so awesome too 😢😢😢
Let us all remember that this is what Sony Japan was killed for. Fucking disgraceful.
Japan Studio was shut down 2 years before Sony bought Firewalk and Sony didn't even see the game until 2023. Is it so hard to use google?
Turning Sony Playstation into an American console has just turned it into another Xbox. You can tell too. It doesn't feel like Playstation anymore.
I had no idea this happened, but a lot of things make sense now
@@simpson6700 This is why there really isn't a big Japanese development presence on the Playstation anymore. They've almost abandoned the JP market entirely. It's pretty sad honestly.
@Vespyr doesn't help that Jim Ryan fired basically all the japanese Sony team. Think they've only got one or two dev teams left
"the best thing here is if good videogames comes out"
- And that is why we need to apply the stick, the stick and only the stick. We have tried telling them politely. Telling them harshly. Not saying anything if there is nothing good to say, and so on. They have refused to listen to anything but the stick. It is only when the stick comes out and come down hard and without mercy they care. They do not care about you, and we should not care about them. If you want good games. Apply stick until moral improves. It is the only way they listen.
Yep, carrot is "buying the game and giving faint praise" but they don't care about what you say only that you give them money
The only thing that affects catripleAAApitalism is refusing to give them money or attention and instead donating all that resource to real independent games
Spot on.
As the Parade Master would say, “Bad children get the stick!”
"PlayStation does not have the entrenched audience who will buy their things sight unseen that they clearly thought they did."
Spot on. Sony fancies itself the Apple of the gaming industry - it is not.
Which is exactly how they thought a PS5 Pro for $700 would sell gangbusters 🙄
@@CyberSpiritSe7n that’s minimum and you know the scalpers are going to destroy its launch
Lets try and get it back like Morbius so we can watch it flop a second time. 😂
@@sneedler5993 Double Sony critical failure yet again
Concord was literally a spiritual awakening. We need it back so we can Concord all over the place and make Concordillion dollars!
@@sneedler5993
Prepare for trouble...
maybe that'll happen when they reboot it.....
if it launches as Concord 2.0 you'll likely get the second flop!
I loved the moment when Concord said, "it's supersonic time", and flew London to New York in 3 hours.
If you create a character, and it doesn't inspire someone to make fanart, you have a dead game.
What do you call a game company that mercilessly goes after fanart and fan made media threatening legal action 🌝
@@Chaoskae Nintendo?
@@firesoldier343 oh snap
@@Chaoskae Nintendo fanart is all over the place. 🤔
@@pragmat1k Sony tried hard to make this game anti-R34 and it shows.
My favorite thing is the $40 argument. No one played the FREE open beta lol. This game was an 8 year failure before it even released to the wild. Bungie better take heed for Marathon. They already have terrible history of launching games.
I have no idea what the free beta was even for if they just did nothing in response to it. They should’ve delayed the game and made it free to play next year sometime, even though it would’ve tanked either way.
@@bencarlson4300
Firewalk studios: "Dearest beta testers, we hear your advice and it's all been very good"
Testers: "So with all that in mind, are you going to make the changes we suggested?"
FireWalk Studios: "We're-"
Sony: "I'ma stop you right there, you're not allowed to do any of that"
apparently more played beta than the release lol
@@scottbyers9258 I knew the beta was out and free but never gave it a go because I was never gonna pay 40 for this game. If it was free I might have played during the beta
I was hyped as hell for Marathon till "extraction survival".
Notice that Jim Ryan conveniently left the company right before all these high profile failures came out.
I think it was because they saw what he’d done that they fired, (sorry, “let him go”) him.
What flops are you talking about? I do know the bad reception concord is having but I have not been too keen on sony. I am just happy to see a reason for companies to stop with the live service trend. I was very active back when every company wanted to have their own call of duty, now not so much.
You missed what I think was the biggest killer for this game. Sony COMPLETELY missing the point when it comes to their target audience. Their big selling point was the "premium experience", "just look at these beautiful cinematics"... Which is BEYOND moronic, since the type of people who play Overwatch are the people who can barely tolerate loading screens. They want to push the "start" button and start blasting instantly, they have ZERO interest in cinematics that get in the way between them and the game they want to play.
I think this, more than anything else, is what killed Concord. They completely failed at basic market research and failed to understand the desires of their target audience!
@@lareolanKFP
You have a good point. Sony’s incredible production values that help sell their single-player games, don’t carry any weight in the live-service arena. Those players don’t care at all. If Sony wants to focus on live-service, the company needs to keep the
productions smaller so they can be released more quickly and as free-to-play titles.
@@bizmonkey007i like Valorants route. Just have the cinematic on RUclips.
Or maybe they can have single player or multiplayer story mode for casual playing with cinematics.
I don't actually know what Sony ended up doing but I am guessing it wasn't anything like that.
I partially agree, but partially don't.
I don't think Condord was trying to be Overwatch, but 8 years too late.
I think they were trying to be Team Fortress 2, but 17 years too late.
Team Fortress 2's cinematics and source film maker videos are a huge part of their marketing. A ton of TF2 players enjoy these videos, and it helps the game appeal to new audiences; it's how I found the game. TF2 has stupid and wacky and characters with a load of clichés, and concord was obviously trying to do the same thing. While TF2's graphics are heavily stylised, they were also very technically impressive by 2007 standards, when the game first came out.
That's true. We care about FPS. Many put the game on low settings to get more frames to perform better. Game looks ugly as sin when you do that, but you get more frames.
@@rd-lw4td that's only for competitive games no?
I only played Sekiro and Nier Automata, in 3d games and 30 fps was more then enough for enjoyment.
Its wild how these companies have streamlined making games so much that they forgot that theyre supposed to be innovative and creative. 2000-2015 was seriously a golden age and we had no idea. During those years the industry had the money to make awesome games but not the greed quite yet
The greed was always there, EA and Activision's reputations were made during that era. What changed, is they moved their internal hiring practices/reward structures away from meritocracy and towards demographic based. Higher prioritization of smaller talent pools, results in statistical losses in efficiency and production. On top of that they created new c-suit level departments empowered with censors veto.
@@walczak9862
"Streamlined."
I would argue the opposite, the games industry has too much bloat. Too many CEOs, board members, stockholders that have a lack of vision for a game, more of a vision for profits and selling to the lowest common denominator.
I guarantee all these games that have been made had passion in the concept phase that have been all scrubbed out due to "risk" and "palatability" for the "modern audiences." Meanwhile they throw millions of dollars at the devs and let them cook with nothing for close to 10 years or 1-2 years and wonder why they lost money.
I wouldn't be surprised if Concord had way more interesting designs in concept art than what we got.
@walczak9862 haven't streamlined enough if dev cycles are almost a decade. Trends change too quickly these days to hitch a ride on trends that will be over by the time the game releases. Just make something fundamentally good and have a good eye for design, hire good talent. If the game gets the big stuff right genre doesn't matter as much, it WILL find an audience.
I’d say the golden age ended in early 7th gen. But no doubt the 6th gen was the peak of the art form.
@@tehbeernerd
I'd agree, but only for AAA games. Indie and AA are still pumping out gems every now and then, but AAA studios are creatively bankrupt now.
I'm actually struggling to think of a AAA game I liked that came out in the last 5 years.
Sony of America runs the show now and gona run the PlayStation brand into the ground.. Sony of Japan needs to take back over the PlayStation brand
This 100%. The game industry has been the very definition of insanity for years now. They keep doing the same thing expecting a different result.
There's barely anybody left to run the brand Japan-side. Jim Ryan laid off most of the people working at Japan Studio when he closed it down. The only remnant of Japan Studio? Team ASOBI.
@@aquapendulum Playstation has mostly ALWAYS been western studios rather in NA or Europe with few studios in Japan.. I am saying the MAIN Company Sony of Japan needs to take back over calling the shots..
Head of the studio side of things is Herman Hulst who is Dutch and lives in Amsterdam.
@@PhotonBeast who has squat running the brand. Sony of America does atm and it used to be Sony of Japan before the mid generation of PS4... Sony of Japan needs to take the reins back from Sony of America but leave the studios as is. Sony of America is driving it into the ground
If only there was a way Sony could have heard the screams and read the concerns when they first announced their live service plan🙄
Big true. But what big corporation does that?
There's too much money to be made. They'll tank the industry before they stop chasing that pot of gold
I enjoyed the faceplant that the game made.
@@darokdeed it was quite spectacular
I give it a 7 out of 10.
It was a solid 10/10 for a faceplant. The only category it deserves a 10 in.
14:14 I am sick and tired of live services; these aren't games but live services. I am sick of live services. Give us games we can play offline, not require PSN, etc, etc. We succeed when live services die.
And while we're at it, give me back my two-player games. I want to play side by side with a friend or a family member - sport, race, shoot, whatever, trash talk and have loads of fun together.
@@soundrogue4472 "But investors want to see funny line go up" -Sony Execs
Shut up and buy the next cod or destiny 3. I am sarcastic. I am with you, but that's what we get until every company implodes and then it takes years to make new games to turn it around. You have to experience trash for 6 more years
I wonder if including some sort of campaign would have also helped. Just to get people to play it.
To be fair even with the game being live service it could have still thrived if it were free to play. Who’s paying $40 for this when Overwatch is free?
Gaming development needs a remaster.
Gaming development needs an enema.
Gaming development needs an exorcist.
Indies have already buried AAA companies like Sony, don't worry. There is an unseen wave right now with Godot engine, and it will be felt within the next 3 years, as the games currently developed in it, release.
We are oversaturated on Live-service shooters. How many options do we need? ... All these companies trying to get on the same bandwagon without any thought for market capacity.
Gaming has always been clone warfare
Early 2010s: CoD clones
Mid 2010s: BRs and hero shooters
Early 2020s: Extraction shooters and live service
@@weirdeurasianboy8091can you point me the extraction shooters? Feels like there's only tarkov and arena.
@@lucasLSD CoD got on the bandwagon with DMZ. Also that failed Hazard Zone from 2042. And Delta Force will also have an extraction shooter whenever that releases
But this time we had the first black transwoman as one of the characters.
@@weirdeurasianboy8091 Man the early to mid 1990s had Doom clones everywhere. There was even a Chex cereal Doom clone called Chex Quest.
I just laugh at another live service failure and keep playing my single player backlog
@@ogun6464 just curious, what single player game are you playing with right now?
@@sqentontheslime1967 This year I played FF VII Rebirth, P3R, Trails Through Daybreak and Stellar Blade, so far. Edit, I just started my first playthrough of Control
Photorealism is technically impressive. But the problem is that most real people are kinda ugly, not to mention adding in random shit like lizard skin. The character design just ends up looking kinda creepy somehow, and not in the good, horror-game kind of way.
Uncanny valley type stuff
And then not even going for realism. Their (of course, needed) fat characters look like they are just inflated
@@OhNoTheFace truly the best representation. they definitely interact with fat people and dont have a thinly veiled disgust towards them
It is very impressive, but if I want photorealism I go outside. Video games are far better at fantasy
@@dontworry1302in the future the games will literally just be movies were the only interactivity is the pause button but still have to pay 70 dollars for
Helldiver's also has the critical booat that pure co-op games are an underserved market. Instead of the opposite that was Concord.
$40 was a problem? How many people signed up for the free Open beta to try the game out? If no one wants it for free, then no one would want to pay for it.
This is like Opening a Resturaunt, got no customers because of the bad food, and blame everything other than the Chef who cooked the dishes.
It's the cover cope for the obvious failure of the game. Concord was mocked the second it was revealed. BEFORE the price was announced. BEFORE the maps were analyzed. BEFORE the game speed was revealed to be sluggish.
But can't let the publishers think that DEI is the problem, so gotta blame SOMETHING.
Worst part is, I'd LOVE to buy Marvel Rivals with Concord's monetization. So much more ethical and fair. But these... cultists... would rather throw gamers under the bus telling publishers we want to get nickel and dimed in "free-to-play" games than admit their agenda is the problem. Ghouls.
Helldivers is a PVE Co-Op game, a genre that's mostly underserved, such so that people are still playing Left 4 Dead. That's why people were willing to buy it.
PvP games are almost all F2P, Fairgame$ going F2P will not hurt the premium perception of Sony. If Blizzard isn't too good for F2P, Sony shouldn't be either.
@@admiralalyssa Hell, if Gears 2 and 3 were on PC, I'd still be playing Horde Mode in them with friends. PvE coop needs more love
@@burnttoast26 Gears 2/3 Horde mode was peak childhood. Right next to Firefight imo.
@admiralalyssa favorite gear moments was horde in river or security and using boomer shields for a makeshift barricade while someone called the sniper/torque bow spawn to kill specials
@@admiralalyssa Absolutely. God damn I miss those days
@@burnttoast26if the new gears is good I actually buy an Xbox for it. That's how much childhood memories I have with it. Playing it with all my friends back then.
The fact that they artificially block people from buying their games released in 2024 if they are not living at the right place on the planet certainly doesn't help. This is true for all their 2024 games except Horizon for some obscure reason, and all the older (2023 and older) of their Steam catalog you can buy and play no problem.
It's like; geo locking is mainly about driving sales of other products to artificially inflate the prices of others and that only
Yeah, I initially wondered how much the Helldivers PSN account issue would affect this. Folks were loving that game and then Sony applied the PSN requirement to negative backlash; folks surely remember a few months back and I'm betting a lot got cold feet knowing the same thing would happen here.
Sony's doing the whole PSN BS so they have numbers to con shareholders with. It's all analytics to continue their money flow and company value in an effort to endlessly grow.
But paying into it is a guaranteed hack waiting to happen
I can promise you that they will not learn from their mistakes, and will repeat it in the near future.
What rock have you been living under? Sony live service push under Jim fizzed out like last year.
@@SpottedHaresit takes years to make games. That's why we still get trash because they were started 6 years ago
You think they have 90% of a product and won't release it? We will get shit for at least the next 2-3 years until the good projects are done.
Good, this is Karma for Sony shutting down Japan Studios.
It’s interesting you say that AAA games have become a big risk. I’ve been saying that for a little while now, but yet the studios still persist in trying to get that Fortnite-type hit.
If a company is losing time and money on a business model that is far from a guaranteed profit, and they’re still doggedly pursuing that model, then it follows that they’re doing it for a different reason. These companies want a captive audience and they’re willing to burn hundreds of millions of dollars for that opportunity.
I think that is wrong though. It isn't the amount of money that is the problem it is the people approving and using that money that is the problem. For instance Concord even with less money would still be a flop, because the people behind it are. The AAA games that have been massive failures in more recent years always care about the actual game last. Can always stand up Hogwarts Legacy or Baldur's Gate 3 as the perfect recent proof of it works when they care to make a game people will enjoy first.
If a successful live service game makes 500 million a year and you spend 100k in 8 years, it is no surprise that they throw darts on the wall to hope 1 sticks.
I wonder what the ratio is between successful live service games Vs ones that nose dive into a sulfur pit?
@@ThePdeHav It would definitely be interesting to see some updated statistics
Id argue it needs to still be sucessfull now for it to count my fav live service personally is warframe
@@ThePdeHav the ratio is irrelevant. You should ask how much they loose versus how much they gain if they hit a live service game. If they make 500 million per year at success and loose 100 million in 8 years they can make 4 games per 8 years until they have a success. It's just how much money the company has to try again. That's why big corporations like Activision /mihoyo/Microsoft don't give a shit when they make trash. That's why Sony is crumbling right now because they don't have that kind of money to spare. In the end the consumer is at fault because they buy it and we see what happens if nobody buys trash. But slap a cod title on it and it would have made millions or even billions and would be successful. Black ops 6 is trash and it still will break their last biggest earning quartal.
Bruh. This entire industry gets SO much feedback from their customers. Way, way, way more than any other industry. Aside from Hollywood, perhaps.
Like...everyone is telling them what they want. Literally!
They need to pay attention. There's no excuse for being this out of touch. Zero.
This game managed to avoid Rule34.
That tells you a lot about why it failed.
I didn't think that was even possible!
underrated wisdom
The teleporting lizard girl in the thumbnail is cutein an annoying way.
@@lobstrosity7163 and sounds annoying in the most annoying way.
Her VA should have voiced Rugrat characters instead.
@@LethalShadow given sony's well known prudeness, I think the characters were specifically designed to defy rule34,
And straight into a tree
Latest reports from internal playtesters of Marathon were not good.
Funny thing about that is that they are salvaging it by putting in heroes, they just pivoted it from custom character to heroes, they learned nothing.
@@micheljolicoeur6094 It's so sad to watch Bungie hollow out Destiny, their cash cow, and pour it all into Marathon, trend-chasing live-service game that's already years late to the trend. It will absolutely sink the studio. Destiny was so much fun while it lasted.
Bellular: "Sony is acting in a reasonably premium and good way. They're definitely retaining their brand image."
Also Bellular one minute later: "As much as we can sit here and laugh at Sony's expense..."
Because doing what they normally do was always going to be stupid for this game
Guess that is what you get when you ask ChatGPT write the script.
Problem with Concord's visuals is not the photorealism. Photoreal doesn't mean "goofy-ass".
there is no way they sold 25000 copies, with that number of players the first few days
600 is the steam, not PS5, users. still a good point
Those arent from people. Those are the copies Store outlets bought. Walmart, Target, Gamestop, etc. THEY are the ones Sony is refunding. Not those tools stupid enough to pay money for this garbage
I feel like we're at a point where if it's *always* risky, then why not try to make something unique and shoot for the fences instead of riding what will be a decade old trend by the time you're done?
That's why they do what Ubisoft does and make Assassin's Creed and nothing but, for the most part.
@@XBluDiamondXAgree. Just pick 1 popular franchise and ride it to the dirt and then pick the next one. Modern entertainment baby
Live-service is a trap. As Yahtzee once said, you can't make a game that wants you to spend all your time and money on it, when people already play a few of those.
Beautifully said. I'm starting to think, they believe that sunken cost only applies to gamers when it comes to their product, never other games that gamers have been playing for years and that they'll just jump ship because of some nice trailers on youtube. They only jump ship if the monetization has become so predatory or the general enshitification has become so bad that the threshold of cost of movement to cost of staying has been stepped over.
Next up on the Sony™ live service slop failure everyone saw coming a mile away Fairgame$
Live-service schadenfreude. Gotta love it.
The most ironic part is that the game itself doesn't even look very photo-realistic. Just set a screenshot of concord gameplay alongside a screenshot of hell divers 2 gameplay - In pretty much every shot helldivers makes concord look cartoonish by comparison.
They poured everything into making the cinematic look good, when they should have been focusing on what would make the game itself look better.
oh yeah because their version of "realism" is just making the player models look like regular people in cheap cosplay, completely ignoring color materials and lighting, even 10 year old games with decent lighting engines look better than this slop lmaoo
Bellular waking up to his notifications like, "Dang i gotta record"
Most corporate boards have figured out they can make loads of money for themselves from exploiting ESG investment, and that's what's happening in all of these various industries where they have stopped caring about sales.
We told them we didn't want these games.They told us, "yes you do."
We showed themNo we really don't!
I'm actually amazed that the game has 2 weeks to live before it got shutdown, that's extremely short live cycle for an AAA game
For any game. And it's not just *a* short life cycle. It's historically short.
it is THE BIGGEST flop of any AAA live service title of all time. You can name other AAA games that "flopped" but they all did better than this.
"Extremely short" is an understatement. It's record-breaking and it's not even close. Even Babylon's Fall lasted 11 months
Doctor: well Jim, I see no reason why your game can't live another 10 years although he will be bleeding players from both ends.....
Concord: eh, I'll die okay I'll just die....
Stony: hold up, we have the technology to save him....
@@Mr.Genesis There's one. "Hyenas". It had a beta, and so few people were interested in it that it was killed days before it was going to launch. It was completely finished and never even came out. AAAA, they called it.
I still can’t believe that gollum, a game not a soul thought would be good, a game that is a travesty on multiple levels, managed to out perform concord is wild, feels like even if they re work this game and re release free to play, they will just have another morbius on their hands where a good beating comes in twos
i know right, i didnt think the bar could get any lower but now i cant wait to see which future game release beats concords achievement of worse opening reception in the history of gaming. lol
Its becoming so often that this type of thing is happening its starting to become its very own sitcom 😄
If memory serves, its stated that the in universe game sword art online sold around 10,000 copies, so in that fictional world, a massively popular success is less than half of a real world catastrophic faliure
Now's a good time to mention that AAA developers are crazy. Whole games fail not because they're bad, but because they don't make back the money (plus interest) on their obnoxiously high budgets. All while they crunch the developers or otherwise refuse to give them enough time to make a good game. Its ridiculous.
I couldn't help but laugh when I was first watching SAO and the game apparently only had 10,000 players.
@@luckyducky7819 8 year is not enough time? Who is the ridiculous one here?
@@steak5599 For what? Concord? You do realize I was speaking on the industry as a whole, right? So to say "your point is ridiculous because this one game had 8 years of development" is ridiculous. What about all the other games that suffered crunch?
Let us never forget that SAO would have been a terrible game even if it wasn't killing people. Bosses that die only once, only one real role for everyone(DPS), players getting UNIQUE abilities that nobody else can ever get (congrats, you've just guaranteed a thriving account trade), a terrible UI of menus in menus like a matryoshka doll of pain
And yes, if SAO happened in real life, 10,000 units sold would kill not only the game, but maybe the concept of VR MMOs for decades, as well as, most likely, the Nerve Gear itself.
6:01 I don’t know if I’d laugh or cry if the episode ended with “In Loving Memory of Concord.”
A damaging aspect of these games (like foamstars) going free to play is that people now EXPECT games to go free to play after a while. Concord wasn't worth playing, and I doubt it could have been saved by being free, but I wonder how many potential players were sitting waiting for it to become free because so many of these games end up that way.
This is definitive proof that Playstation console players are not "de facto" purchasers and players of *Every* Playstation title
The fact that the same top 5 live service titles haven't budged on the PS5 proves that.
The entirety of the industry, players, and the media propped sony up as this "Can do no wrong" publisher and this console generation
has shed light on how false that narrative actually is.
They think they're Nintendo where the first party have high attach rates. Sadly the wrong fan base gestation occurred with Sony
@krspaceT1 It doesn't help that Sony makes very little attempts at challenging Nintendo's stranglehold on the family market. Not every kid wants to, is interested, or can afford to play the types of games Playstation offers.
@wolfboy527 ASTRO Bot isn't a bad attempt, but they put little effort in. Knack was their most concerted go at it
@@wolfboy527considering console prices also anyone who buys a Playstation is buying concord
@@krspaceT1Astro Bot is a step in the right direction, however much of Playstation's "Mainstream" players are the type that shove a game like that off into "its a kids game" never land.. and never touch it because its not hyper-realistic
It's almost like people play games for the games and not for their revenue model
I hope this whole thing will encourage big studios to shorten their development time. I'd love to see more smaller, well polished games
even watching concord gameplay feels like i need to put the video to 2x speed to get the normal movement speed of similar games.
if watching it already feels so slow, how bad is it even when you play it?
I really like how you break down the gaming news from a dev point of view. Its always fair as well. Cheers.
Sony dropped the ball so hard by not releasing a Twisted Metal live service game yet. At the peek of battle Royals was the time and they still haven’t even made one.
That franchise would've made Sony easy money there.
I think you guys overestimate how many people would play a game like this for the long term as live service.maybr I am wrong but it sounds boring after 1 month. Could have profited from the TV show that was rather successful and would have made enough money to stay online I guess. But that's why corporations don't make those games. They dont want 20% more money in return. They want Fortnite or genshin money. Making them 100+millions per month.
@@majorshepard2 did you see destruction all stars? That’s something I think they would have to expand into twisted metal. After your vehicle was destroyed, you would be on foot as a person. If they made a good map that permitted fun gameplay as a person out of the car alongside the twisted metal traditional gameplay, I believe it could be successful.
I hear you though, but I wouldn’t doubt that it would’ve been more successful than Concord and destruction all stars. It’s just insane that that IP has been dormant for years and the first form of media we get for that is a half ass show. I personally did not care for the show even though I’m a fan. I would’ve been better suited to just be graphic as hell/way over the top.
@@JgorinacI should have clarified. I loved twisted metal back in the days. I would definitely play a new game if it's good. Like you suggest the franchise needs new ideas to spice it up. I am just not confident in thinking that the Devs nowadays can bring a game like this to the next level to make it lucrative enough for a studio to produce. That's the sad part, that so many old games were so damn good that would deserve a new game or remake, but they just crunch the numbers and deem it as not worth it. Because they can't strike gold with it. It's a shame that every game has to make 10+ times their expenses nowadays so we will never see these types of games again. Odworld comes to my mind when I think of great games and never get a new title
04:36 regarding the "poor marketing" I didn't even know concord existed until i started hearing news about how it bombed. Not that I would have played it even if I new it existed for a variety of reasons.
Marketing for games I find do not work at all unless it's a beloved entry like halo 3s release. Marketing is supposed to get you more hyped. Unless you search out the trailer, are you really paying attention to their RUclips ad that intruded on your video for the fourth time in 40 mins?
Making a live service game is like putting a few million dollars into a slot machine, then giving it a pull to see if it works, and then claiming "you have a buisness model"
I love that they’re coping so hard that they’re blaming it on the $40 game price. Meanwhile the most common unit you see in First Descendant’s starting are is Ultimate Bunny. This CHARACTER is a $100 btw.
I'm waiting for axe to fall for fd worried about neon's choices in the game in regard to monetization. Devs are great and pretty open though. The price on bunny ult is related to price of biggest bundle prime access from warframe (better deal) their bundles r 60 for accessories plus 60 dollars in premium, 80 for frame/ weapons including slots and reacters for all of them and premium currency doubled from 60. And 100 for both combined (aseccories are generally inaccessible after access except for prime resurgence which is a new thing
You can farm it though, don't be fooled.
First Descendant is like the extreme example of bad character design, if Concord has ugly characters, First Descendant has sexdolls, both are pathetic
@RRRRRRRRR33 big difference is one sells the other does not. That's a "know your audience" right there
@@Eyran84 Popularity don't represent quality. I've seem many comments saying First Descendant has "good design" if compared to Concord, that's nonsense, both are equally ridiculous. Every week there's new hentai games on steam, this crap is popular and there's a audience for it
Now we know the exact size of the 'modern audience'
dont forget to subtract the developer head count from the player numbers, because you know for sure they were leaving their accounts logged in just to not be at 0 players
Considering there were more devs at the studio than people playing the game.........🙃
you mention payday 3 as if that's got a chance at being good, not to anger the devs, but the choices made early on from corporate standpoints tanked the hell out of that game.
"Qualities resonated with players?" I'm sorry what? What Qualities? What players? 😂
All the devs moms 🤣
@@matthewoconnor2742 dont forget all the "influencers"/Yters they shipped the game to, to try garner some hype lol... it wouldnt actually suprise me if all their active players they currently have arent playing on a gifted version of the game.
I want single player. I WILL own my games. If those 2 things don't start materializing I'll just play my backlog.
You’d think Japan 🇯🇵 Studio could have done a lot with that money. 💰
Hard to say, recently, Japan game industry have been under pressure from Korea and China.
Im pretty happy to watch AAA Games fall apart. Maybe when q big company falls under we will get back to the glory days of the early 2000's. Excited to see gaming rise back from the ashes of the last decade.
Yeah, who could have known that making 12 live service games simultaneously would not end well...
A game having a big budget, but bad writers/art direction is like making a fighter jet and putting a baby behind the wheel.
Sony assumed Nintendo like brand loyalty. Which they don't have for many reasons. Even that isn’t one to one, many Metroid fans don't play Mario and many more Mario fans don't play Metroid. You have more crossover than if they weren't Nintendo games but that is thatvway for many reasons.
The stereotype about Nintendo fans only buying Nintendo is not built on nothing.
Sony assuming a game succeeds based on being Sony doesn’t work with their reality. 1st party attach rates aren’t anything close. Add to ot marketing issues and you get a disaster.
And expecting PC to make up the slack failed even more on top of it
Somewhat ironic that Concord should last exactly - A Fortnight. 🤣
This thing's getting "Willowed" for a tax break.
The live service market is oversaturated, people can only reasonably have a few of those that they play on a regular basis because they require constant attention, and it hasn't done anything groundbreaking to grab interest. With such an oversaturated and competitive market there's no way something just 'okay' is going to work, especially not with a $40 price tag for entry.
Why Sony when they started with this plan didn't start with games that were already successful on their previous consoles. Fat Princess, MAG, Warhawk would had better choices of games to rebuild for modern hardware and bring back a playerbase.
I would love Fat Princess to be brought back! It would've been so much cheaper and more fun.
Jim Ryan tenure as Sony CEO was an utter disaster that threatens the gaming divisions long term prospects
Why is it every Gen between Xbox and PS they switch to "no, im the biggest idiot" meme... One face plant one Gen the other capitalize then when they are on top the face plant the next gen and it continues from there.
This generation, however? Feels like both PS & Xbox have fallen asleep at the wheel and have crashed into everything, including each other.
i dont think triple AAA games are risky, i think its risky always betting on the safe option and the betting on what people say they want, we need old school rockstar and valve back
any gamer could tell you, with those characters, it would fail..
...
new live service IPs can take off, LOOK AT THE FIRST DESCENDANT.., WHAT'S THE BIGGEST DIFFERENCE ON FIRST GLANCE?? THE CHARACTERS!
Honestly I'd barely even heard of Concord... then again I'm very much an old school single player experience gamer myself, I play very, very little multiplayer stuff . The last big multiplayer shooter game I put any significant time into was Overwatch before we learned the absolute toxic dumpster fire Blizzard had become.
Remember Hyenas?
Sony is in a little trouble lately.
Hyenas was SEGA and had nothing to do with Sony at all
I forgot about it since your last video on it lol. I shit talk bad games to my friends all the time and Concord completely slipped my mind.
This is all on Jim Ryan and his lack of understanding why live service games are popular as well as being years late to the party. There is a reason why he was told to resign right before all these came out. The writing was on the wall. They went from 12 games down to 6 and that was decided 2 years ago so who knows if the rest will even release. Fairgame$ (lol dumb name) will suffer the same exact fate of Concord if released. Jim Ryan fucked this generation of playstation. It's why it doesn't feel like there are many exclusive/current gen games... his focus was mainly on live service bullshit. I will give him a sliver of credit for wanting to get some new games for in between their big releases from the likes of naughty dog and sucker punch and blue point, etc, since games are now taking almost triple the length to develop as they did in the PS2/PS3 era.
Phil Spencer is doing the exact same thing to xbox but in a different way by gobbling up all these third party studios to try and get exclusives for their failing platform (console wise). It was such a bad decision financially that they are now not only releasing those third party games they bought to be exclusive (lol) on other consoles as well as their own first party titles.
It is a bad time for gaming overall even with great releases sprinkled throughout like Black Myth: Wukong. It's terrible for gamers, it's terrible for devs, it's not good for anyone, not even for the execs, suits, and shareholders. Ming boggingly how the industry got so far down this incorrect path. Raytracing, realistic graphics, micro-transactions, etc.
My personal take is to bring the industry to modern PS2/XBOX 360/PS3 era with smaller titles like Black Myth: Wukong and Helldivers 2 and Palworld and Lies of P and AstroBot, and others. As a gamer who started on and has been gaming ever since the first Playstation console released, I was always excited for the new consoles to be able to make the games I'm playing now (mainly PS2/PS3 games) much more in-depth with vast improvements to npc AI and gameplay but instead it's tried to constantly keep up with the hardware with raytracing and realistic graphics as a priority vs innovative gameplay. I just hope something changes in the industry and we see better games and less layoffs.
Suffice it to say, this was a major mistake on all counts. These guys need to get their acts to together.
There's only so much space for multiplayer games to be successful that's especially true of live service games. I like the look of First Descendants but I already have Warframe and I'm not interested in spending hundreds or thousands of hours in any other game. I imagine many other people are in a similar position.
Live service games are not popular, there just happen to be popular games that are live service. The fact they don't get that is one of the things against them.
@LilFeralGangrel the best thing about first decendent that not many games capture are the massive boss fights vs collosus (shooter against a massive boss)
@@Notnownev Yes, but counterpoint : depth of gameplay is harder to put as a line going up for bored old investors whose main gaming experience are slot machines in casinos, than polygon count.
This puts a smile on my face, live service is just like the plague for games at this point
devs were touting the first black trans character hours before the game died.
The problem isnt there being a black trans character, its that these devs and publishers think its a key selling point, and then berate you when you don't open your wallet for them.
This was generic ESG funded corpo slop out of the gate, so I certainly wasnt paying for idpol nonsense like that.
I also don't understand why so many commentators are hesitant to even name this- its not voldemort, you can say it. Its obviously not the only factor or even the biggest but its significant enough to sour a large chunk of potential customers. You can sit there and say "oh well stop injecting culture war into this-" no no, look at these devs, everything they do is deliberate and with the intention of injecting the very nonsense you refuse to talk about.
I can't wait for this to return as free-to-play so it can fail again, and no one will be able to avoid talking about WHY.
I do feel bad for the animators and people who designed some of the visual fidelity for concord, because aspects of the game are absolutely beautiful. Those cutscenes are pretty dope too. Just seems like they missed the mark HARD on so many other design choices.
Imagine if this slop made the money back. We'd be in so much worse space in that alternative reality, where AAA could do everything wrong and get away with it even on 1st game in new IP. In our reality they recently could have done 2-3 games wrong on established IP before profits crashed, but it seems audience is waking up to the problem. Playtime of older but better games remains high. Next Total War, next CoD, next whatever still has big advantage but its not printing money regardless of quality.
Good, let those Live Service games fail. I hate them.
The issue with these types of games is, there are a finite number of gamers that play these types of games. MANY of these gamers already have years or decades invested in other games like this. To get these players to want to start over, the game has to offer them something they aren't getting what they are currently playing. It's a huge time investment and unless the game is knocking their socks off and giving them exactly what they want they just aren't going to play it.
Sony should get used to nobody buying live service games
The second Sony since their live service cap plans a while back now, I had a vision that precisely matched what’s happened with Concord. Me, and everyone else, I reckon.
Anyone who thinks Fair game will be a different story is on pure copium.
Tired of live service. Never liked it. I work 10 hour days (sometimes 12s) and the last thing I want to do when I get on a game in my free time is do a bunch of boring tedious daily missions to earn points to work towards some random skin or consumable. I just want to play a game and have fun. Fomo is a curse. Of course I want some cool limited time items. I just don't have the time or desire to "work" towards them. I don't mind unlockables that are a challenge to get, (secret weapons or outfits in games like dead space or resident evil) but I can work towards them at my own pace. They aren't going anywhere. Everything these companies do isn't for fun. It's to push people to spend money on premium currency, or buy extra levels in the season pass. It's despicable.
Marathon and especially Fairgames will most definitely bomb, too. Also, we do have a Nintendo Seal of Quality in 2024, it's the Nintendo brand on the cover. They only release bangers.
They also don't baloon budgets, understand marketing, and 'DEI' better.
Last one is a spiteful joke aimed at those comments. But Nintendo fans lack those idiots compared to Sony
only bangers? pretty much all of the pokemon games have been complete ass for the last 10 years
@@yet0another0account ....Since XY? Geeze, I have my gripes with the Switch games but that's a very harsh read. Honestly even Scarlet and Violet aren't that bad. I don't like Dexit, but having played hundreds of hours the graphical issues are really overstated.
Also compulsive 'Game Freak is not Nintendo' spiel.
I wish Sony would realize good games get good results
I'm betting 25 thousand was way more than they actually sold.
Course, now it's 0. 😄
most of them sales are most likely gifted copies of the game to the devs, their co workers, family and friends lol
The rest will be mostly gifted copies to influencers and their close friends ect considering thats the route they went down as for adversiting.
Obviously there will a few "special-headed" individuals who had a smooth brain moment and purchased the game themselves but i dont believe that number is more than the current active player count.
From what I've heard, most people hated Concord's character designs more than anything. If they made the same game in Ratchet & Clank universe, LittleBigPlanet, or similar to playstation all-stars, we'd probably be singing it's praises. I wish they'd take 20% of what they put into this to resurrect one of their many dead franchises.
Let’s say this game was selling for $75.00 a copy (I know it’s closer to $40 a copy).
At 25,000 copies sold that means they raked in $1,875,000. That is not bad for a game that cost an EXTREMELY conservative $100,000,000. I’m sure they’ll be just fine. It’s not like they completely and utterly fucked themselves trying to be politically correct while wantonly bashing the very consumer base that would’ve given them infinitely more success than the base they were pandering to. Yeah. They’ll be just fine.
I just hear that blizzards 120$ game releases is the future to go😏 maybe go up to 150 in 5 years, saying the new generation makes it so much more expensive while you have less employees because ai took over their work.
As someone who really doesn't care for this game on a conceptual level, but is utterly fully behind the Stop Killing Games initiative and game preservation, I do believe those 15-25k should be able to play this in the future. At least hopefully most people get their refund, unless they bought it from brick and motor and they tell them to shove. In which case, that's a real tragedy. 200+ mill down the drain. That could have gone to many smaller games with half to a quarter the dev time, not just one big better one. Shameful display, honestly.
They just need to make a couple characters female and make him look like they're from Black desert online and they'll have a better chance of getting more people to play
Yeah, imagine Widowmaker or Tracer main to change their game because of ANOTHER hero shooter after 8+ years of overwatch release.
@@gentlehilt9750overwatch is dead so it could fill that gap like marvel rivals will when it releases
Or they can go try the Snowbreak route. Which literally save Snowbreak from the brink of bankruptcy.
Marathon has a massive head start over both Concord and Fairgame$. It won't be DOA like Concord was. Whereas there's a decent chance that Fairgame$ is.
Good, live service games should fail, most are just money grabbing machines