Rumor: Sony Getting Massive Tax Write Off For 'Concord' After Shutting Game Down And Closing Developer Firewalk Studios
A new rumor alleges that Sony is getting a massive tax write off after it shut down Concord and its developer Firewalk Studios.
In a recent video upload, Endymion shared information from what one of his inside sources informed him.
First, he said, “Many of the devs at Firewalk were very confident that Sony would not cancel the game because of what the game represented for the company and the agenda at-large. Sony America assured Firewalk that they were safe and Concord would come back better than ever in the future.”
“However, as I’m told, the reason why Concord did die and Firewalk was closed was because of Sony Japan,” he continued. “During a company vote Sony Japan overruled Sony America and rejected their proposition to allow Concord to be revived. Claiming that the game was a massive failure and there was no reason to bring it back and waste more resources.”
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Next, Endymion shared, “Instead, this has led to what my source was told to cause Sony, in general, to opt for a tax write off for Concord and Firewalk instead. My source told me this write off has led to Sony recouping somewhere between 25 to around 40% of the cost for Concord and Firewalk now that they wrote it off for a tax write off.”
“So let’s say they spent $400 million, they got about maybe $170 million-ish. I would wager more like $150 [million], but it’s somewhere in that range,” he speculated. “Basically, Sony got back enough in that tax write off to create two whole Ghost of Tsushima’s in total.”
“But, as I’m told, this veto to not revive Concord and kill yet another project, it pushed Sony America to become very infuriated to no end,” he said.
Sony shut down Concord less than two weeks after the game released after the game only hit a peak concurrent player count of just 697.
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Game Director Ryan Ellis announced the game was being shut down in a blog post, “At this time, we have decided to take the game offline beginning September 6, 2024, and explore options, including those that will better reach our players.”
Fast forward to the end of October and Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Herman Hulst announced that Sony was shutting down Firewalk Studios.
He said, “Regarding Firewalk, as announced in early September certain aspects of Concord were exceptional, but others did not land with enough players, and as a result we took the game offline. We have spent considerable time these past few months exploring all our options. After much thought, we have determined the best path forward is to permanently sunset the game and close the studio. I want to thank all of Firewalk for their craftsmanship, creative spirit and dedication. “
Hulst added, “The PvP first person shooter genre is a competitive space that’s continuously evolving, and unfortunately, we did not hit our targets with this title. We will take the lessons learned from Concord and continue to advance our live service capabilities to deliver future growth in this area.”
It was rumored that it cost around $400 million to develop Concord even before any marketing costs.
Former IGN writer Colin Moriarty claimed that the original owner of Firewalk Studios, Probably Monsters spent $200 million developing the game before they eventually sold the game and Firewalk Studios to Sony.
Sony then spent another $200 million in development with Moriarty claiming, “When the game had $200 million spent on it and was basically in an Alpha form in Quarter 1 of 2023 from that point until the game launched Sony spent another $200 million on it.”
Former Dragon Age director Mark Darrah crunched the numbers and came to the conclusion that the $400 million production budget was most definitely possible.
He concluded, “I think we can make it plausible that it did. Certainly, for a game with this relatively small scope it’s hard to see where all of that money went. It would have had to have been lost in iteration. It would have had to have been lost in inefficiencies due to team structure or massive team sizes. Like we just went through, I think you can make the math work and it might represent reality. It’s also possible the sources providing this number are exaggerating, or misinformed, or getting their math wrong in some other way.”
“So I’m certainly a lot more willing to believe this number than I was before I started this exercise, I still don’t know for sure that $400 million is the actual number.”
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