Rumour: Concord Cost $400 Million, Sony Believed It Was the 'Future of PlayStation' | Push Square

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We promise we’re not trying to rub it in, but Concord is such a historic flop that some of these stories simply can’t be overlooked. Speaking on the latest episode of Sacred Symbols, veteran ex-IGN reporter Colin Moriarty said he’d spoken to a developer on the first-person shooter, and claims the game cost approximately $400 million, making it the most expensive PlayStation first-party project ever. That’s an astounding, bordering on unbelievable, number if accurate.

Moriarty claims that Firewalk Studios had spent around $200 million at the start of last year, prior to Sony’s acquisition of the developer. The title was originally being funded by Probably Monsters, with PlayStation signing on as a publishing partner. It’s unclear, then, how much of that original $200 million had come out of the platform holder’s pocket.

However, when it acquired the studio and took full control over the project, it allegedly spent a further $200 million getting the title ready to release. According to Moriarty, the game was in a disastrous state as recently as 18 months ago, with no player onboarding or monetisation designed. Outsourcing was required to get the project into shape, and to be fair, what did release was relatively polished – albeit extremely barebones.

Moriarty explained: “It’s the biggest game Sony’s ever released from a budgetary standpoint from a first-party. There are games in development at PlayStation first-party that are more expensive from a budgetary standpoint, but as of the games that have come out so far, like Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, this game cost more. And they lost all of it.”

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He then goes on to explain why PlayStation spent so much on the game: “It was heavily championed behind-the-scenes. The term had been used verbatim behind-the-scenes that ‘Concord is the future of PlayStation’. This game was referred to internally as a Star Wars-like project for Sony. It was designed to be repeatedly