Concord had it’s Open Beta this weekend, following on from the recent closed beta. I jumped back in, having had a great time during the closed beta, but this time I noticed something very different. The online reaction has been very negative, and very loud, which has led me to wonder what’s going on with the reaction to Concord. Today I’m going to have a look at the Concord reaction, reasons why is it what it is, plus try to answer the question ‘Can Concord be saved?’.

Before we dive into things I want to say I really enjoyed my time in the closed beta. I tried out every character, all the different game modes and had fun. Sure there are some pretty big improvements needed, but the fundamental gameplay is good fun, which is the most important thing with a first-person shooter like this. I came out of the closed beta positive about the game’s future, but then I started seeing the reaction online, and since it’s only snowballed from there.

So I jumped back into the Open Beta this weekend, having spent time experimenting in the closed beta. This time it was much better, as I switched between characters, getting those team buffs, plus I put together my own set of free gunners with the crew builder system. All the things I didn’t really understand from the closed beta I put into practice here, and things felt good. Firewalk Studios opened up a new gamemode this time, meaning more game modes to play throughout the open beta.

I still think the gunplay is good. The maps are OK, they certainly don’t blow me away, but they’re pretty good, and I was having fun across all the modes I tried out. I was having most fun in the Takedown and Trophy Hunt playlist, so while I did try out the other modes, I prodominantly spent my time there. Now I know the maps, the spawn points, the health pick up points and also the characters I was able to assemble a team that worked for me. My top characters so far are Itzy, Lennox, Haymar and Teo. I prefer the traditional first-person shooter characters in the roster, and I was doing alright in matches. I had fun over the weekend and came out of the Open Beta looking forward to the full release.

Then I started looking at the reaction and the stats. The player count wasn’t good reading. The all time peak for the beta was 2.3k. That was shortly after release. Just to compare Destiny 2’s 24 hour peak was 76k, Overwatch 2 was 44k, The Finals was 16k, Helldivers 2 was 32k. There are plenty of caveats here. It’s a beta, there are probably more players on playstation, but still… 2.3k is worrying.

The player count hovering around 2k for an open beta doesn’t look good for the future of the game. At this point with an Open Beta you want players knocking the door down and wanting to get in. This is a free beta, and the game is going to cost $40. If the player count is this low when the barriers to entry are also low, what are they going to be like when it comes money to play?

The other concerning thing looking at the Steam numbers over the weekend for the Open Beta is they were declining player numbers. We started with a peak of 2.3k, it went down over the next 3 days the game was available. This is bad news and means players may have tried the game at the start of the beta and then didn’t come back.

Why have there been so few players? There are likely a few reasons working together here.

Gameplay – It’s decent enough, but is Concord doing anything to stand out from the crowd? It’s fun, but does it differentiate itself from other PVP games? It will likely attract some fans, but will that be enough?

Characters – Players don’t seem to like the characters. I don’t think the cinematic at the Sony event during Summer Games Fest helped. Fans reacted badly to the cinematic. I think with a game like this gameplay is the core focus, if that’s fun THEN give me more lore about the characters. The way it was presented felt backwards, they led with the narrative and then showed the gameplay.

Price – It’s $40 to jump into this game, compared to free for other shooters like Destiny 2, Overwatch 2, The Finals, Valorant etc. While there are benefits to having a price for entry like keeping cheaters out, this is a very competitive market and first-person shooters live or die on their player counts.

PR – Sony have been relatively quiet about this game. They announced the game in May 2023, then followed that up with the cinematic and gameplay reveal in May 2024. That’s a long time between announcement, where we didn’t know what the game was, to gameplay reveal with the cinematic. I haven’t seen much press from Sony or social media from Firewalk Studios.

The big question is ‘Can Concord be saved?’. I am hopeful this comes out and finds an audience, because I enjoyed my time with the beta, I found some fun playing the game. But the player count doesn’t lie. Concord had a max player peak at 2.3k over the open beta weekend, and ideally you want 10x or 20x more than this to be successful. Helldivers 2, another live service game from Sony, was trending over 200k players when it launched. Yes, it’s a different genre of game and it caught players imagination and perhaps inflated Sony’s ego when it came to live service games.

We’ll have to see what happens between now and 23rd August 2024, when Concord is due for release. It feels like the game needs some major work before the release, and we don’t really have the time left. I want Concord to succeed, but my honest opinion right now is it doesn’t look good.

Let me know what you think in the comments.