Maybe it’s just my circles but when Sony dropped the trailer for Concord, I would classify the response as ‘disappointment.’ The reality is, that we’ve seen a lot of live-service games come and go, and the response would have you believe that the gaming landscape is overwhelming with hero shooters. I think hero shooters vary wildly when it comes to gameplay and just because a game has heroes doesn’t necessarily mean the heroes are going to resonate with the player. I’ve seen a lot of trend games in the past and I believe my time spent in the beta this weekend proves that Concord isn’t one of them.
Firewalk Studios
The PlayStation Plus beta I was invited to (for having the prestige of being the type of dingus that subscribes to PS+) had two modes and what seemed like the full roster of heroes or freegunners. I was treated to an opening cinematic that explained how we were able to fight each other but not really why we wanted to fight each other or take on jobs, and some of the character’s personalities. Once at the main menu, I saw exactly what you’d expect. A place to see and customize my freegunners, where to play the game, a lore codex that was inaccessible during the beta, and the job board which is just your challenges. Not really shooting for the moon here with Concord.
And quite frankly, I felt that way about Helldivers 2, Sony’s last victory in the multiplayer space. Keeping in mind one of the reasons Sony wanted to buy Bungie was to focus on multiplayer GaaS titles. Their strategy seems to be, not one of trying out something interesting or compelling (leave that for the indies, am I right,) but focus on a refined experience. Concord feels really well-polished. Team synergy was really impressive, each freegunner was fully fleshed out and had strategies beyond rock-paper-scissoring other freegunner, and felt like they belonged in the world.
And it all starts by just joining a fricken game and getting used to the controls and freegunners at your disposal. At a $40 price point, it seems unlikely that any freegunners will be omitted but their variants will require some work to unlock. Each freegunner has a lil’ polychrome triangle with a Roman numeral in it, indicating the variant number. It’s just a lil’ passive that, I imagine, will determine how you’re going to play the freegunner. Roka, for example, has a homing rocket launcher that, with her first variant, locks on faster while hovering. Only one variant was available in the beta, thus far, and that was Lennox. I didn’t really enjoy playing him so I didn’t check out the variant.
Firewalk Studios
Separating itself from the pack, Concord felt more like an older multiplayer shooter than anything I’ve played recently. The two modes were Brawl and Rivalry and they featured two variants of each mode to play. Brawl had Takedown, which is just a team deathmatch, and Trophy Hunt, which is just collecting bounty cards from fallen enemies. You know, kill confirmed. Rivalry has you playing in modes more focused on rounds than respawns. Clash Point is a single point in the center of the map that’s capturable. You get on it, capture it after a few seconds, then the progress ticks up to 100% and you win, or you eliminate the enemy team. Real simple stuff. There’s another variant called Cargo Run which sounds fun but I don’t think it’s in the beta. As much Rivalry as I played, it never showed up.
Here’s the description though, “Plant the cargo in a zone and defend it from rivals.” Sounds alright, I would have liked playing that occasionally.
Each freegunner has a crew bonus based on the type of freegunner they are. Things like Wardens giving longer weapon range or Anchors increasing the healing received. This is likely why you’ll be building your crew rather than simply having the full roster at your disposal. Though you can create a crew of your own, in the current beta, there was no real reason to use something other than the default roster. If you were playing Rivalry, winning rounds would typically remove the freegunner you won with from your roster, so in the crew creator you could double or triple up on some of the freegunners to your liking. But I was focused on rounding out my experience.
Concord reminded me a lot more of Call of Duty multiplayer than it did any of the existing hero shooters. Obviously, with the setting it’s not at all like Call of Duty but the game modes were leaning harder on teamplay deathmatch than any pushing of carts, battle royaling, or saving hostages. Some of the freegunners have really interesting loadouts as well, like 1-0FF which is a big friendly robot that sucks up projectiles and uses them to recharge his trash bomb ability. Likewise, Lark the myconid whose skill loadout drops pods and spores that help with mobility for both Lark and their teammates while also slowing and making their enemies more vulnerable.
Firewalk Studios
What can I say? I’m older, I grew up on games like Quake II and Team Fortress Classic and Concord felt like a return to that style of gameplay. I don’t think Concord is a direct parallel to either one of those games but the vibes were there. Concord’s open beta starts on July 18th and ends on the 21st and will be available to everyone, including PC players. The full game will be released on August 23rd, 2024.
