Concord Developer Firewalk Studios Shut Down

Sony has announced that it is shutting down Concord developer Firewalk Studios, and won't be reviving the game at all.

Transcript

00:00How's it going everyone, Mike Strauss, Senior Editor here at Insider Gaming, and Sony made

00:08the announcement public shortly after the news was first broken by Bloomberg's Jason

00:12Schreier and corroborated quickly by Insider Gaming sources.

00:16The announcement came via the company's official website in a memo from PlayStation

00:20Studios CEO Herman Hulst.

00:23Hulst says that, quote, we consistently evaluate our game's portfolio and status of our projects

00:28to ensure we are meeting near and long-term business priorities.

00:31As part of our ongoing efforts to strengthen SIE's studio business, we've made the

00:35difficult decision relating to two of our studios, Neon Koi and Firewalk Studios.

00:41Hulst says that over the last few months, the team at PlayStation explored all of their

00:44options regarding Concord.

00:46Despite those efforts, however, the decision was made to close the studio and sunset the

00:50game for good.

00:52Hulst says that, after much thought, we have determined the best path forward is to permanently

00:55sunset the game and close the studio.

00:58I want to thank all of Firewalk for their craftsmanship, creative spirit, and dedication.

01:03He then continued by saying that he knows that none of this is easy news to hear, particularly

01:07with colleagues and friends departing SIE.

01:10Both decisions were given serious thought, and ultimately we feel they're the right

01:13ones to strengthen the organization.

01:16Concord launched in late August to less than 1,000 players on Steam and only sold roughly

01:2025,000 copies.

01:22The game was shut down just two weeks after its release, with talk of potentially returning

01:26later on as possibly a free-to-play shooter.

01:29Ultimately, that didn't happen and Sony has decided to move on.

01:33There was no mention by Sony if all of the employees will be let go or some might move

01:36to other areas within the company.

01:39Insider Gaming has reached out to Sony for clarification on employment status for those

01:42at both Firewalk Studios and Neon Koi.

01:45In 2024 alone, there have been nearly 14,000 known jobs lost to layoffs within the games

01:50industry across nearly 160 companies.

01:53When you look at layoff numbers not yet made available, we're looking at likely over

01:5716,000 at this point with still two full months to go.

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