Culture Killed Concord

[@Tommy9834]

This reminds me of a story I heard growing up. There was once an emperor who waged war on a distant land. Every day, he got an update from the front lines, informing him of victory. He got reports of victory after victory until the enemy army was at his gates.

[@Felled-angel]

@@Tommy9834 this actually happened during the Mongols campaign in China the capital of Xi Xia, Yinchuan if I'm not mistaken in 1209

[@greasy8394]

Sounds like Hitler vs Russia to me lol

[@nullpoint3346]

That's practically Ancient Egyptian History, minus the gates part. They only wrote down victories, but they got closer and closer to places of importance.

[@markdsm-5157]

i think you're seeing this wrong. More like the emperor ignored reports from the front lines because he thought his goals were righteous and his strategy infallible until the enemy army was at his gates. Prioritizing agenda over it's customers.

[@Veylon]

Was the emperor Hirohito by chance?

[@Gusttafa]

They forget that buying game is not duty.

[@laurafryer6321]

Yes! Games only exist by the grace of gamers.

[@agps4418]

@@laurafryer6321 that's actually a profound thing to say!

[@thatguyfaiq7161]

Of course. We buy it to have fun, not to fill executives pockets

[@elgusaniiiodeljuego6823]

From a certain point of view, it may be already. We need to keep an eye on where our taxes go...

[@maxog90]

​@@laurafryer6321 Game has a product,no customer,no product.

[@kinghappyspoon]

The Algorithm brought me to this video today and I just wanted to say, your journalism and delivery remind me of the early G4 days and your professionalism is a breath of fresh air when compared to the high energy hyperactive norm that is youtube reviews. You've got my follow, my like and my comment. I look forward to watching more of your content!

[@laurafryer6321]

Thank you for your kind words and for your sub!

[@beebobox]

Could not agree more!

[@hermitcard4494]

Consider this: even knowing nothing about the culture wars, wokeness, far right, gamergate, whatever, the rest of the world outside USA *didnt felt any curiosity over this game to give it a chance.* Meaning these designs and presentation was naturally repellent for every gamer worldwide. Same with Dustborn.

[@charlesatanasio]

I mean... the characters all look like they've been wearing those shirts for two days.

[@destyrian]

Errrrr you realise this crap is world wide and not just contained within the USA, don't you?

[@gownerjones]

@@destyrian It is really not. Especially not in the largest video game markets, namely China.

[@Marcara081]

@@gownerjones Ha ha ha oh man, wait until you research it. China funds ESG to the tune of trillions IN OTHER COUNTRIES. That's simultaneously why it's not in China AND so prevalent everywhere else. They see it as culture-rot and have exported it to their enemies.

[@oscarsalas1]

@@destyrian as a Costarrican I can confirm this DEI/Woke stuff is coming from the US mostly, TV shows, games, movies etc. I mean it's everywhere but not that hardcore as the stuff coming from the US. A friend of mine living in Long Island showed me a math exam of her 3rd grade daughter and every single math problem and question were about gay/trans stuff, that's WILD and unthinkable down here in south america.

[@Hiro2219]

I'm not a video-game dev, but I'm a technical architect in software dev, and so many of your insights are 100% applicable in here too, if senior members aren't heard they'll either tune out and just do what's asked of them without truly contributing or they'll just quit. Communication really is so, so key on teams.

[@laurafryer6321]

Great comment! I agree! Definitely true with all software development. Thanks for watching.

[@1kreature]

This is actually true for hardware development too. Asking "Have we thought about this..." or "Are we taking a shortcut here?" and being told one is just being negative also leads to hardware engineers finding other work. "Critical design review" is the name of the meeting, and yet one can no longer ask critical questions? I think this video is the most insightful I have ever seen about issues in modern game development or even development in general.

[@laurafryer6321]

Great point! With hardware it's worse since changes take weeks or months versus minutes. Thank you for stopping by.

[@mini-mei]

I'm a technical writer in a software company, and I couldn't agree more. The stupid workarounds/corrections we have to do, just because people don't communicate/ask. Also, on a tangent 'cause it fits: people have forgotten comprehensive reading. I seriously have to shorten e-mails to single questions or statements, because many don't read past the second paragraph, asking me a second time a week later about something I answered in the previous mail.

[@1kreature]

@@mini-mei Very true! I may be guilty of that myself actually. I keep telling people, there is a subject field in an email for a reason. However, if they put "Beer night! Wo's in!" and I don't feel like it I won't even read the email. If they are stupid enough to add a question/warning in the same email about lack of availability or even full obsolescence of a major hardware component stopping next manufacturing run then it is on them.

[@danielreed5199]

One of the most important things I ever learned about game development is that you are developing towards a moving target. Because of this it means that developing a game in a linear fashion is unpractical, it needs to be considered dynamically. Want to add a feature you have never heard of in 2 years time? plan for it now. Want to adjust for user feedback over the next few years? plan for it now. Things need to change, things will change... so plan for it now.

[@laurafryer6321]

I agree completely. Putting a buffer in your schedule up front is critical. Thanks for watching!

[@VeraxMusic]

Yup, you have to be Agile basically. Not a waterfall.

[@ZiggyPanda]

Edit: wrong video 😂 I got multiple tabs of your channel open

[@SeriouslyTechStuff]

Similar thing happened with Anthem from Bioware. They refused to look at Destiny for what it was doing right and told staff to not play it or even speak of it. So strange.

[@laurafryer6321]

Good point about Anthem! It's crazy that they weren't allowed to speak of it. Thanks for stopping by!

[@Sam-uz4iy]

Anthem wasn't even the first project to have communication issues from Bioware, Mass Effect: Andromeda preceding it was a buggy mess. There's a culture problem going on there too. Weird how many NA companies are suffering from this in recent years.

[@SeriouslyTechStuff]

@@laurafryer6321 Thanks for making such great videos.

[@KuroiNeko05]

There's multiple reasons for that, like not wanting to be accused of being a Destiny ripoff, Anthem developers hating Destiny and/or their devs, or avoiding any influences from similar genres so that the project is 100% their vision so they feel vindicated that it's this vision that is the reason for the games success.

[@RafitoOoO]

@@Sam-uz4iy soon Bioware will cease to exist. Dragon Age the Wokeguard will fail hard and EA will just axe the studio.

[@dragonfalcon8474]

Some of the devs saw their playerbase as "talentless freaks". Not surprised Concord failed. Sounds like it deserved to.

[@ancientnpc]

That was the most accurate reveal of the issue. Right there.

[@StudioUAC]

why do they think it's cool to insult your potential customers?!

[@SHMidlerPlays]

@@StudioUACwho knows

[@miriamkapeller6754]

@@StudioUAC For me, the hypocrisy is far worse than the insult. How little self-awareness does someone need to have to call someone else talentless when they have just released one of the worst games in history?

[@dragonfalcon8474]

@@miriamkapeller6754 So true, oh the irony.

[@benin2059]

You're way more experienced in life than the average male young streamer/youtuber analyzing this case in a shallow way (which i dont dislike anyhow) and it shows! Even maybe not being from this bold generation you totally know the ways of the culture as clear you say of gamers and young communities. This content is great, it overviews objetively and not only dramatically like other content creators, and has a nice editing and production effort. You are a rare diamond in the make in terms for an influencer soon to be a powerhouse.

[@laurafryer6321]

Thank you for your kind comments!

[@dopaminedrought395]

@@laurafryer6321 I wanted to comment something similar, but they phrased it much better than I could, so I'll just say I wholeheartedly agree. It's refreshing to see mature, knowledgeable people with experience and sense making content that is so accessible. The information you share is worthy of corporate trainings, but I have the privilege of watching it on KZbin.

[@MrGryph78]

Why are you bringing gender into this discussion? It's pretty insulting to discount the voices of half the commenters who had things to say about this game and many others who have followed a similar trajectory. Especially when that half of the population make up way more than half of the playerbase of games like this.

[@georgesmith5201]

Gamers impress me. There are so many people who play video games, but their ability to be utterly disinterested in something is unmatched. Not even 1,000 people played that game.

[@SWOTHDRA]

W for us

[@therealspoon69]

@@SWOTHDRA ubisoft is also down 80% the last five years so theres still hope. and phil spencers empire of blue haired homos is also crumbling.

[@mechanicalmonk2020]

And they are also arbiters of what's actually good based on player count and revenue, which is why obviously only games like Genshin and Fortnite are good.

[@eduardomartin8510]

@@mechanicalmonk2020 The salt, I can taste it. Yummy.

[@XDHJ7]

​@@eduardomartin8510 bro its culd copum

[@aquapendulum]

I see a similar situation at the workplace of some of our clients in the entertainment industry. Actually, I heard what the employees on the tech side told me: There is a creative leader, there are smaller creatives working under him or her, and then there are the nerdy tech bros. I talk to the last group because I work on the tech side. On at least 4 cases, the story is the same: The creative lead is very confident he or she had a great vision, the nerdy tech bros see problems very early on as they implement the requests, but their feedbacks are always dismissed with phrases like "Well, now we know you're not our target demographics", "I'm the Chief Creative and you're not for a reason" and sometimes "This is not your job, we have Marketing and focus groups for gathering feedback". And then when the projects got far enough to have something to show to a focus group, too much work has already been done, all they could do was tweaking around the edges. Creative lead is too sure of his or her vision to admit that the nerdy tech bros had a point early in the project, so they just ship with some last-minute minor changes. The clients I worked with in these cases are not even big players in their respective entertainment industries, but these stories just match up too well with the output of the actual game industry-leading companies.

[@laurafryer6321]

Wow! Thanks for sharing your story.

[@guyincognito1406]

Ahh I’m one of those nerdy tech bros (20 years software dev) we give feedback because we see games as a sum of mechanics, there’s always some niche system that a really hit game presents that nobody did, or tweaks it… they just ignore us I’m like smh my moms was playing Mario in downtime at the hospital in labor with me, my 72 year old father is still playing Skyrim… but nah what do I know I’ve only been on these my life. Half of em don’t even know pinball was for gambling.

[@masterkendro]

This was so refreshing to listen to. You're actually sane and making sense, thank you for that!

[@enderguardian7443]

@@guyincognito1406don't call yourself a tech-bro my guy. tech nerd would be more fitting as tech bros are a combo of a frat bro and tech nerd

[@connor3284]

@@enderguardian7443 Maybe he likes beer and football.

[@stefanjoksa]

"I went through parts of my life where the last person that I wanted to play was me in a video game". This phrase is something that so many western companies don't understand today. They keep on trying to push identity and idea of people being able to identify with a character based on their looks. It's very superficial thing to identify with and I always say that it doesn't matter with whom you identify with, what's more important is whom you empathize with, who's perspective and story you can understand and fall in love with.

[@devxved]

I've tried to make myself in a game only a handful of times. And every time i do and get it right, i laugh and hit recreate character.

[@stefanjoksa]

@@devxved every time I've mafe myself I played for couple of hours, didn't like the way my character looked and chose a default character xD

[@SeraphsWitness]

It strikes me as narcissistic whenever these goons complain, "I never see anyone that looks like me in games". Well, who cares? Why the hell do you need a character to LOOK like you? I don't care if a character is a white male. It means less than nothing to me.

[@LumaTo]

IDK. I don't necessarily want me myself in the game, but aspects of myself in them. Thankfully there are more and more games where Native American characters are able to be played, and character creators have presets that match at least one archetype or two that I can tweak. I appreciate the option, and the variety. It just won't excuse a bad game or one with bland character design.

[@SeraphsWitness]

@@LumaTo characteristics maybe, but physical attributes? I've never once wanted a character to look like me in any way. My favorite game growing up was tomb raider. Couldn't be more different than me.

[@dezmundtv962]

Many of the demo players for Concord gave polite and constructive feedback months before the game's launch. Many of them stated that the games price tag was a bit heavy, considering how it offered less than it's competition in terms of gameplay mechanics and features. They suggested that Firewalk studio reduce the price tag or wait longer and add more to entice consumers otherwise they wouldn't be interested. They ignored %100 of all player feedback and went ahead with a product that was already a hard sell, and here we are today.

[@WuRuYi]

Given how long it spent in development I think they just wanted to release it and move on, regardless of how successful it was. After a point it becomes virtually impossible to make back the money you spent developing. Sunk cost, and all that. To paraphrase the video, if the feedback process breaks down, the game can end up so far off track that making a game people want becomes very hard.

[@GodsFavDrunkDriver]

I do believe that studio was not a game studio, but just a bunch of "activists" pretending to be one...

[@youngwt1]

That’s interesting, I think part of hell divers success is that they put it out cheaper and it was in the range that people thought fuck it I’ll give it a try

[@Chastity_Belt]

Honestly, i would not be intrested in this game even if it 15$ or just free. It just looks unexcited.

[@zhenyucai8688]

There's just no talent in this studio. It took them over 4 years to make a hero shooter....a game like overwatch or valorant only took 2-3 at max. The team on this game was also massive and burned through cash. Compare it to a game like black myth wukong which took relatively close to the same dev time with 1000x more content and a fraction of the team size.

[@ysiadpir1423]

Building anything inside an echo chamber is risky.

[@Barni2212]

Especially when that echo chamber caters to the 0.01% of the audience.

[@Sam-uz4iy]

its mostly risky when they have a budget for the mass market but their echo chamber is tiny.

[@beefgoat80]

They're having trouble swallowing the fact that _they_ are the vocal minority, not the other way around. 🤷

[@mrman6035]

Specifically discord being that echo chamber.

[@mainstreetsaint36]

If by "Echo Chamber" you mean trying to copy Overwatch, and doing it poorly, then yeah "Echo Chamber."

[@blampfno]

This is the result of having an organization that is 100% cheerleader and 0% coach or players.

[@TheZero696]

They totally hit the mark on grabbing their target "modern audience", all 660+ of them.

[@nullpoint3346]

"+"?

[@Mr.Blob007]

@@nullpoint3346 get it, because lgbtqa+ has a ‘plus’ sign in it

[@pleaseenteranamelol711]

@@nullpoint3346 AKA 661 perhaps 663

[@4ph1-c]

@@nullpoint3346 ps5 players

[@hulkkrogan420]

I own a PS5...had barely any players on PS5 either.

[@kowaikokoro]

turns out calling your potential customers ''talentless freaks'' is bad for business.

[@emikochan13]

i doubt many people actually saw that. the drama was not the reason the game failed.

[@earlyriser03]

@@emikochan13this. It’s a comical take that is firmly rooted in one being perpetually online, and one that has almost no impact on the actual customer base.

[@Shadowl]

​@@emikochan13there was a ton of videos on KZbin mentioning precisely that lol. Everyone knew about it. How can you say that stupidity didn't affect the game?

[@pptemplar5840]

​​@@earlyriser03I mean, it's clear that this game failed for almost EVERY reason, definitely not because of some stupid comment. Like obviously, I might have heard the NAME of this game mentioned once before I was receiving news that it was apparently supposed to be huge and that it spontaneously deflated. But considering that Ubisoft is arguably still taking lumps for saying much less hyperbolic and stupid things (a real achievement for Firewalk to beat them in this regard honestly), I think it's totally fair to say that this would have hurt the game significantly. It's just that inc concord's case there's basically no game to hurt, it BARELY materialized at all, of course there's no consequence for the game/studio if they never obtain anything worth losing.

[@MrYupsilon]

what a surprise right

[@yezki8]

8 years, 8 YEARS Not a single one of those dev said "hey maybe this design is bad". And even if there is, not a singe one listen For 8 years

[@trip9845]

As Miss Fryer said 3:17 3:40

[@davyjones5361]

Even worse, they loved their design

[@gortonsfisherman4622]

I'm sure there were some dissenting voices, but they were either pushed out or ignored and eventually left the company.

[@jorgeporras9262]

There were some older character designs floating around and they looked amazing. The ugly character designs were done on purpose and probably forced by some manager position obsessed with the concept of breaking stereotypes.

[@peters4115]

They just Yas Queeeen each other while taking breaks and mental health breaks 😂

[@Larry]

I'd say the initial trailer for the game didn't exactly help endure people to Concord's premise. It felt like it was advertising a completely different game. A bit of a sucker punch from the developer. But I am surprised they focused on Overwatch's popularity as the greenlight. Two similar games to OW were also released at the same time, BattleBorn and LawBreakers, and they failed spectacularly. So how that wasn't a red flag to them is beyond me.

[@yurigagarine6998]

I genuinely thought this was a Guardians of the Galaxy tie-in game except that they couldn't afford to have the likeness of the movie actors like in that Avengers game.

[@harrymorris2361]

@Larry Hello, you! I mean, I don’t even remember hearing a peep about concord until everyone kept talking about the character select.

[@Kaimax61]

And the only one to survive the Overwatch Launch was Paladins, which was Free 2 play out of the box.

[@Larry]

@@Kaimax61 Valorant has done okay, but they really dragged their heels bringing it to consoles.

[@shingshongshamalama]

Capitalism has a tendency to see success, take completely the wrong lesson from it, and then desperately try to clone it.

[@Xaito]

Modern game devs: "We've made a game we like" Investors: "Did you make a game, gamers like?" Modern game devs: "Gamers?"

[@laurafryer6321]

LOL! Thank you for watching and for commenting!

[@mechanicalmonk2020]

Gamers: we want devs who are really passionate about what they do!!! Devs: hey we made this with passion Gamers: wait no not like that

[@OdaSwifteye]

​@@mechanicalmonk2020 Putting words into people's mouth's eh? No! Gamers want games that are fun.

[@DruuzilTechGames]

@@mechanicalmonk2020 Putting Communist politics into a game isn't passion, it's propaganda.

[@GBNationalist]

@@mechanicalmonk2020What an amoeba. 🤦‍♂️😂

[@SkyBabyBoom]

Gotham City Imposters was actually a very fun game. The characters were not inspiring but the gameplay was awesome IMO.

[@laurafryer6321]

I'm glad you enjoyed it! Thank you for checking out my video!

[@1LuckyB07]

Myself and a bunch of my friends had a blast playing GCI. It was such a light hearted and endearing shooter that actually played really well. Good times.

[@neogiu000]

The gameplay was so good! I played it a ton when I was a kid and had no money for the big games lol

[@melvin4524]

Man I wish I was in the game's industry in the early 2000s. It really was the Golden Age of Games

[@laurafryer6321]

It was pretty cool. I think it will be again. Thank you for watching!

[@hermitcard4494]

Just play classics. Still, that wont let you live and experience the 90s and early 2000s. What amazing cultural times.

[@Prizm44]

Meh, early 3D console games looked like shit, even at the time. Outside of PC gaming, I hated that era.

[@chilbiyito]

​@@Prizm44idk about you but i enjoyed games like armored core, resident evil, mgs and silent hill

[@Rapscallion2009]

For me it was 20 years after the golden era. What was really fun (and I was really young at the age) was the early 1980's when video games were still being worked out. You'd get something knocked out by 2 guys in their back bedroom and distributed on tapes you bought in a newsagent. Nobody knew what the rules were and did people want puzzle games? - arcade replicas? - weird, intellectual games or offbeat games? - how about academic or brainy games? - or trying to accomplish in 46k and 16 colours what people still struggle to do today? - the sheer diversity and variation of ideas was amazing. As was what some people accomplished with the basic hardware of the era. Gaming was different and still required you to use your imagination a lot - that white circle on a black background is definitely an alien planet full of weird culture and interesting things! that triangle of pixels - a galactic warship! Some games (text adventures) had no graphics at all and just described a scene for you to imagine and you set there picturing yourself strolling through a mythical kingdom. The video games of that period has a particular, special feel to them because the "money men" arrived and everything became about the "next big thing" that would pay for their new Porsche! The closest thing I can think of is the early days of the internet in the mid-nineties when it was the chaotic wild-west.

[@MikZran]

I have led a software team, and I know you are right about how when feedback is ignored, programmers become clock punchers and not active team members.

[@laurafryer6321]

Exactly! Thank you for watching!

[@Rapscallion2009]

Absolutely nothing exclusive to software there. It's just how people are. The thing is that you do need both types of people for anything.

[@PhthaloJohnson]

If you ignore someone's feedback what else would you expect of them other then doing the work you assign to them specifically. Being passionate and contributing more then is asked of you works if the person doing it believes that their work will amount to something in the end.

[@DefinitelyNotAMachineCultist]

@@Rapscallion2009 100% this. Problems only occur when you don't tell clock punchers they're supposed to be clock punchers, _or_ you tell them they're clock punchers, but then act as if they're not, expecting them to shoulder decisions, responsibilities, and risks beyond their pay grade, forcing accountability down the 'chain of command' so that the higher ups can cover their asses. That or their input is ignored, and you're still surprised they become clock punchers. Saying that everyone is accountable is one of those cute, warm and fuzzy sayings that you can _smell_ the BS off of in corporate settings. When everyone is accountable, no one is. The idea of equal accountability is a con to dissolve it.

[@maximus4765]

1994-2014, 30 years of pretty good games.

[@ArtUniverse]

This is what happens when the target audience of your game are your investors and shareholders.

[@SeraphsWitness]

This was not some failure of capitalism, comrade. You can't spin it that way.

[@ArtUniverse]

@@SeraphsWitness Funny that you say that because I'm as right wing as it gets. It doesn't take a comrade to point out that they had no idea who the game was being made for.

[@SeraphsWitness]

@@ArtUniverse Of course not. But to blame that on investors and shareholders is bizarre, when it's the developers who are so far left that they can't tell Ayn Rand from Tucker Carlson.

[@SeraphsWitness]

@@Dumpty-e5y nothing to do with capitalists. The opposite.

[@Chowbogan]

Absolutely not lol. If they really wanted to play the market they’d have done exactly what this video was talking about: do some user research.

[@humrH2360]

From what I've seen of the game staff's social media accounts on top of the overall design, it is incredibly likely that there was a highly toxic work culture and a social bubble in place. The timelines match up for Concord to have been inspired by Overwatch when it started development, but it was clear that there was a refusal to think long-term and watch the changes in the market. And the character designs show a massive lack of cohesion, as if there was no communication between the designers and their appearance, role, and color palettes were determined by some sort of mad libs raffle. My brother-in-law even said that the characters look like they were designed by AI. But the lynchpin of my suspicions have been the highly insufferable, hostile, and egotistic behaviors of the developers on social media when this game got released, put through the wringer, and finally canned. They showed a blatant lack of responsibility and accountability, trying to spin anything from this game as some kind of win. I can't imagine _anything_ getting done with people like this. Even if someone were to tell me "but they don't represent the entire team!", remember that it takes the efforts of countless people across lord knows how long to create something great, but all it takes to make it come crumbling down is one idiot and a few seconds.

[@Yattayatta]

I completely agree with everything you said here. We can do a quick thought experiment to show how right this turns out, lets imagine we go to a McDonalds to order food, the staff overall is great, but there is one server that for one reason or another just looks at you with disdain. When your order is finished, he opens up your burger right in front of you, spits on it, and puts it back in the box, all while filming for social media. Would this one action from that employee damage the McDonalds brand? Yes, very much so, even though everyone else at every restaurant are perfectly nice and competent. So the excuse "It was just one dev that said blablabla on twitter" really doesn't work, you wouldn't accept this in any other line of work.

[@mrturbo84]

If you would look into the new Design Position so called Narrative Designer... you will find out that these People have so much influence in the game they have every finger in every Department.

[@easportssucks4347]

This sort of thing is a huge cultural problem in America right now, across all industries. People want the paycheck and the power, but want nothing to do with the accountability that comes with it.

[@statikk666]

The 'broken feedback loop' applies to many businesses, where the manager rolls out projects that are not viable but they like them.

[@Minebot45]

Finding out that _Concord_ started development in 2016 made everything click. The _Guardians of the Galaxy_ movie's writing style and the MCU's visual language hadn't worn out their welcome yet, _Overwatch_ just launched at $50 and was making money hand over fist, the American culture war and all the shit that came with it hadn't yet become the all-consuming cognition monster we know it as today... No wonder this game flopped so hard it needs to be measured on the Richter scale; the target audience doesn't exist anymore.

[@Gansimus]

Dammit people. She's not talking about the "culture wars". She's talking about the culture within the company. The values they hold, how they decide to interact with themselves, their customers, their peers, their direct reports/leaders. How they decide to identify problems and solve them.

[@silverhawkscape2677]

Literally showing how the people in this culture war calling gamers taelentless are Toxic themselves.

[@trip9845]

so? Concord's visual design was based on DEI ideals and made for the "modern audience"

[@r99azm80]

See forest for the trees, huh? 🤡

[@jankbunky4279]

Just more proof the anti-wokies are at least as tribal and brainless as the people they believe they're arguing against.

[@ninjagoboy46]

@@trip9845okay? And that's not the point of the video, it suggests you don't actually want to engage with what the creator is saying and instead want to push your culture war agenda just as strongly as the developers pushed their ideals...

[@tr777th3]

This is why you should never attack or ignore your audience's feedback, because it truly matters to listen to them the most especially when they're the ones who pay you.

[@linming5610]

The problem is, they don't want to listen to "far right" people and outright dismiss anyone showing even just a tiny tendency of being in the opposite side.

[@mechanicalmonk2020]

​@@linming5610 "look, I just have some general constructive feedback that's definitely very normal: no fatties or black ppl ok?"

[@shoulderpyro]

@@linming5610 Though when you then put it into perspective, those wokies see everyone who doesnt directly agree with them as "far-right" regardless of their ACTUAL views. They /could/ be far-right, but more often than not they're either central, or even on the left themselves

[@fenrifegads5571]

This is why you should learn from the past. Weimar specifically... It aint about audience, profits, or sales. It's about divisive and demoralising propoganda.

[@Voliopop]

​@@linming5610idk man I've seen some shitty opinions and criticism from people from that sphere

[@darkwingduck9589]

Every high school graduate should understand the danger of echo chambers. If you are producing something that has to perform in the real world, you can not allow an echo chamber to form.

[@blakepollock8074]

it happens within the teaching staff who would be educating them on issues like this, human nature is self defeating.

[@basileus-pr6jh]

You got yourself a new subscriber. How wonderful with an informed and critical yet fair voice which avoids the pitfalls found in the discourse of culture wars controversies and game journalist polemics. Absolute outstanding quality content.

[@laurafryer6321]

Thank you! I appreciate the sub!

[@Moskeeto]

Yeah, this is a great and very insightful video. I thought by the title it would be some culture war nonsense but I was pleasantly surprised! It's too bad most of the comments here are talking about culture ware nonsense as if that's the issue with games like this failing.

[@basileus-pr6jh]

@@Moskeeto I agree, but it goes for both sides. There is no doubt that certain elements within Firewalk Studios attempted to wanted to insert culture wars nonsense. The culture wars rhetoric is equally annoying coming from the right as from the left. And when you browse the internet it's quite obvious that a crowd of "the game failed because of racist gamers" is battling the crowd of "the game failed because it went woke" while the silent majority just couldn't care less.

[@LauraLovesHugs]

@@basileus-pr6jh i mean in the case of this game, literally nobody is blaming its failure on racist gamers, that's not a thing that's happening. the other argument is being constantly spammed everywhere, as you'll see by the comments on this video being such a cesspit.

[@Weremole]

I think many read "Culture" and decided to comment without watching the video and getting the context...

[@DZ-X3]

There's a really interesting mix here, with some people gloating about a victory in the Culture Wars, on any forum that's remotely related. On the other hand, there are plenty of people here with something novel to say as well. I'm glad for those boilerplate comments, though, as they probably helped push this video to where I could see it.

[@ThePaulineu]

Yeah, workplace culture is different from "culture wars"

[@Tuntira]

I was one of those, but this video is actually bang on.... I still think that the 40 dollar price was the biggest anchor, character designs can change, but that price hits hard. Also factor in that the presentation at the onset has been poor, so the game was already fighting an uphill battle

[@dangox3370]

there's just no doubt about it. That sort of "culture" is a big reason why concord failed. The character designs were so obviously political.

[@tarekcat1]

​@@dangox3370 still it wasn't the topic of this video

[@cameronsalmon1314]

One thing I’d like to add is the surge in popularity in Indie games and how they kind of just *work* in this market. They usually have a significant amount of love poured into them, with passion being the most motivating factor for releasing them and less about money. As a gamer, it’s much more appealing when the game you’re interested in purchasing was made by a small development team that wants to make a fun game and build a community rather than make a profit for their parent company.

[@ITAmich]

I absolutely, most definitely DID NOT get teary eyed hearing Totalbiscuit's voice again. RIP TB.

[@cl8804]

nt, jewbani

[@laurafryer6321]

I couldn't agree more. I remember that he was so kind to review Gotham a second time after we fixed some of our issues. Thank you again TB.

[@hershmergersh6733]

his WTF is Space Marine video popped up on my feed the other day. Had a similar reaction

[@gownerjones]

Oh no, I read your comment before it happens in the video. Now I am prepared with tissues and cookies.

[@nailertn82]

He left a void nobody managed to fill ever since. Sometimes I wonder what he would have made of the massive schism the culture war opened up in gaming.

[@TwilightWolf032]

The reason Concord failed is because it wasn't made for gamers, it was made specifically for the people up top making the decisions. "It's not made for you", "This is the game I would like to play", or so they say. The message was heard, loud and clear. We're not the target audience and you hate us! So we're not gonna buy your game! Simple as that!

[@AndrewJHayford]

The video literally says exactly what you just did

[@TwilightWolf032]

@@AndrewJHayford I condensed it.

[@drunkenhobo8020]

​@@AndrewJHayford I know it's rare, but people can agree on the internet.

[@theobell2002]

Don't you think you're being a little dramatic here? Like, something not being for you doesn't mean the makers of that thing hate you. Settle down.

[@TwilightWolf032]

@@theobell2002 Developers are going off on interviews, podcasts and twitter threads explicitly saying they hate gamers for over a decade now.

[@surrounndedbyClowns]

When you hate your customers, its only right that you fail miserably

[@Jomiixx]

she is not talking about culture war bullshit you should actually watch the video

[@surrounndedbyClowns]

@@Jomiixx and I'm not talking about culture wars either, you should read what I wrote again.

[@hope-cat4894]

Ignoring criticism from the paying customers is not a culture war issue. It became a culture war issue when they used political beliefs as a justification to ignore the paying customers. ​@@Jomiixx

[@theobell2002]

@@hope-cat4894 Oh, you mean the thing that never happened?

[@hope-cat4894]

@theobell2002 You're really going to ignore the weird articles attacking a random youtuber for not wanting to see Ghostbusters 2016, fans being called sexist for not like the character Rey, and everything else that's been going on since 2016 to now? Oh, well. It is what it is.

[@alexe589]

The market didn't change, at least not much. If this game had come out head to head against Overwatch, or even Paladins, it still would have fell flat on its face.

[@Peb02497]

And then theres Valve using the Blue Ocean strategy with Deadlock melting TF2 with Dota 2 making a Moba with third-person shooter controls and hero shooter designs

[@hastyscorpion]

What? The market changed a ton. Overwatch is bleeding players. This type of game is not in vogue.

[@Frontline_view_kaiser]

@@hastyscorpion Thats simply fatigue of Overwatch And it has nothing to do with the game failing. There was no time, no place where this game would have sucked not sucked

[@lucasLSD]

@@Peb02497 Blue ocean? They just arrived late at another genre, it's just Smite steampunk bro.

[@lucasLSD]

@@Frontline_view_kaiser Maybe if they had actually delivered the single player campaign instead of quietly cancelling it and only telling everyone else a whole year later.

[@Cosmocroft]

I cannot get enough of your videos they are so informative especially during this crisis in the industry

[@laurafryer6321]

Thank you! I'm glad you find them informative. It's definitely been a rough few years for the industry.

[@pat7d9]

@@laurafryer6321 I agree. Everytime I hear of some goings on in the industry I check to see if you have a take on it.

[@laurafryer6321]

Thank you! I appreciate that you keep checking in!

[@nekad2000]

Crisis? Meh. Gaming is just course correcting. It was hijacked by activists a decade ago and gamers, always slow on the uptake, are now getting around to rejecting the garbage. It's a great thing. So crisis? Crisis for activists maybe.

[@zorro18759]

what crisis?

[@xPXGx]

This video randomly popped up on my feed and I'm glad it did. It's a breath of fresh air to get an informed opinion and insight from a game dev. Even more so considering you have witnessed, first hand, mismanaged environments. So many problems could be avoided if leadership simply listened to their team. But you're 100% correct. When people feel ignored and disrespected, they'll simply give up and eventually quit. It's not worth the stress and hassle.

[@blknmild]

Thank you so much for making this video! As someone who has worked in the film industry for many years and is now in the game industry our perspectives are not always well understood. First and foremost I am a gamer. I saw the issues with Concord coming from miles away and could have predicted its reception by the gaming audience. On the other hand, it's hard to feel nothing but sadness when I see my LinkedIn pile up with "Open to Work" notifications from my peers who have no say in the big decisions of film or game making, they just have families to feed or need to pay their rent. Many videos have relished in the demise of Concord and are full of emotion but I love the approach you've taken in your video. Regardless of emotions or which "Side" you're on, there are lessons in game development that seniors in the industry know but are pushed aside or are forgotten due to bad leadership and ideological stances which create toxic environments. I ultimately hope we can just get back to making fun games and the layoffs/studio closures stop. I look forward to seeing your future videos!

[@amharbinger]

How much is Sony really hurting after this? They had Pixar level CGI trailers and cutscenes, even a special edition controller. But even when the game was free during the beta, it barely crossed 2K players on Steam. I would argue that Overwatch proved that if you make a game good enough people will be willing to overlook the paid pricing. Yeah, it launched in 2016 but the game was so good that people didn't care about the $60 even if it had loot boxes. Despite a negative reception surrounding it, the content, heroes, maps, and great gameplay have held it over. I played Concord during its free betas, it was painfully average. Everything about the gameplay was either mediocre or done better in other games and the player count reflected this. They made something worse than bad, it was standard. To the point the character designs were made not with fun in mind but a message, and gamers are getting sick of it.

[@SWOTHDRA]

But overwatch 2 was free to play so the hype wore off quickly , those type of games are dead in the water now

[@changen4125]

@@SWOTHDRA overwatch 2 was overwatch 1 with a couple of new maps and buffed tanks. It was the same game that we played for the last 8 years. Shit has gotten boring. The hype for OW2 was for PVE content and coop, and they killed it immediately, which completely killed the concept of the project.

[@chrislex2598]

Thank you for articulating this issue so succinctly and professionally. 2024 is looking to be the year that all AAA titles flopped and the people responsible for said flops keep blaming the customer and now they're even calling you a grifter. That to me right there illustrates the culture problem you're speaking of in this video and I agree that if said culture doesn't change, the consumer will not let them survive.

[@wandererlidia]

Love your vids and the calm delivery of your insight. To many of these discussions these days are way to angry for me to watch after a week at work.

[@laurafryer6321]

Thanks! I'm glad that you enjoyed it and I hope your weekend goes well!

[@alicaljungberg3742]

@@laurafryer6321 It's really interesting to hear the perspective of the production and publisher side of the games industry. As a gamer of 25+ years now, it's a perspective I feel we almost never get. Most of the insights i get come from independent games-media and when they occasionally get an unfiltered interview with an actual developer, who will very often blame most problems in the industry on the publisher side.

[@hunted4blood]

Man, I can make do with the little tidbits you've given us, but I would love to hear an inside retrospective on the life and development of Gotham City Impostors. I picked it up right at the end of its life, so I only have 117 minutes of playtime in the game. But they were a distinct enough 117 minutes that they stick out in my brain even 10 years later, which I think is the sign of a game with an incredibly strong foundation. Such a shame things turned out the way they did.

[@laurafryer6321]

Thanks! I'm glad that you enjoyed the game and I appreciate your comments!

[@joefur2835]

@@laurafryer6321 Laura I’d like to thank you. You’ve earned my subscription today. It’s amazing to hear these insights from within the industry and to look at these failures from analytical viewpoints. Being a veteran in the industry gives you a perspective that is extremely unique and personal.

[@chesterstevens8870]

​@@laurafryer6321 And you worked on Crimson Skies, too? That was the game that convinced me to buy an OG XBox, thank you so much for the memories.

[@laurafryer6321]

Thank you! I appreciate that you subscribed and you like my content!

[@laurafryer6321]

Awesome! I loved working on Crimson. Jordan and his team were amazing. Thank you!

[@βιτψηασσνιγγα]

Very interesting to hear the perspective of someone who actually worked in the industry

[@KonaSuba]

Yeah, it was pretty clear the dev team wasn't listening to anything and got themselves into an echo chamber

[@Mikx100]

And gaming journous run with it being a "good game" to the end. News flash people play the good games.

[@asshrimpleasthat799]

This was such an interesting and informative video. As someone who’s very interested in speculating on exactly what went wrong here it was very refreshing to see something like this after sifting through so many hyperbolic and poorly-researched clickbait videos about the situation. Looking forward to checking out the rest of your catalog!

[@laurafryer6321]

Thank you! I hope you enjoy the other videos!

[@59Klicks]

I love your unbiased and honest take on the gaming industry, coming from a developer's perspective as well as that of a gamer, which you undoubtedly are! If we ever needed a spokesperson for gamers and like-minded developers, you would definitely have my vote! The way you approached the subject logically and fairly from all sides was a breath of fresh air. Your presentation was so engaging that I could listen to you explain how grass grows for hours. As one of the commentators here said, you have my subscription, like, and comment!

[@laurafryer6321]

Thank you for your kind comments and for the sub!

[@aggressivecalm]

When your "modern audience", is less than 2% of the population, and less than 2% of them are gamers... You have made some ridiculous absurd business decisions.

[@CommanderLongJohn]

Ah but you forget they make up over 50% of all Twitter and Reddit users . . . . Thus, they somehow have validity and a voice and "matter." So much stock has been put into virtual words typed up by random-complete-strangers in a world full of over 10 Billion people, it's truly mind boggling.

[@nonbiri8904]

What crazy is, half of them are probably the ones who dominates and dictate the (western) industry right now means they have 1% less customers who will buy since they're the ones who creating them, now they only need to appease the 1% to start gaming

[@DioTheGreatOne]

​@@CommanderLongJohn This is why I hate social media. Because companies think that social media is an accurate representation of what most people think. They're using Twitter and Reddit as sources of opinions, even though those places are known for having people with very biased opinions and a very distorted view of the real world. Heck, imagine if some company used 4chan as a sample of opinions?

[@baalfgames5318]

Okay, I'm really getting sick of this whole "modern audience/woke" bullcrap. You guys make it out to be a literal crime to have anything other than sexualized straight white humans as characters in games.

[@aggressivecalm]

@@CommanderLongJohn Indeed. Pretending, and pandering to this microscopic group with the insistently demanding voice (Twitter and Reddit users... IGN, Kotaku...) that they "matter" above all others; has only had one outcome. And that is that this microscopic group with the insistent demands has become progressively demented, unbalanced and entitled. (It’s all very like pandering to a spoiled three year old child. You're really doing nobody any favours, including most of all the child.)

[@BubbleTea033]

4:08 I can say with absolute certainty that a lot of young people with good heads on their shoulders and lots of passion for the medium are just choosing different career paths entirely, because they foresee this happening to them. I don't need to get hired and work on a project to know that this kind of culture would absolutely kill any interest I have, and I'd just do the bare minimum to get the product out. I couldn't see how that would ever lead to a fulfilling career, and given that the pay in games is still ass, even now, I just couldn't justify it. I would have loved to work alongside a team of people like you, Laura. Thankfully for me, I'm doing good running my own business in a different industry, so the choice doesn't keep me up at night.

[@ngsmoov]

Hi Laura! I worked at WB Games and met you briefly a few times. I still have my "Office Batman" Imposters shirt! Great video. Would it be cool if I show this to my classes? I'm teaching CG animation at a gaming college now and still do contract work on the side. :) Maybe we could even bring you in as a guest speaker sometime if you're interested. -NGSMOOV, Randall (Ng)

[@laurafryer6321]

Hi! So good to hear from you! Of course you can show it to your classes. I think we're FB friends so you can message me there about the guest speaker idea. Thank you for watching!

[@spicysealion-et8kf]

In an age where Genshin Impact makes billions, they thought these designs could work.

[@edubs9828]

One of the most surprising things to learn about Concord is the game mechanic that was anti-rewarding for players. After you play a round as any character, you're not allowed to play as them again. So the game actively discourages you from maining a character? That might be the most antithetical game mechanic for a hero shooter. It reduces the loyalty anybody has to any character and makes the game that much harder to learn. You can't just main 1 character at at time, you have to try everyone, all the time. Wow. Just Wow. How was this not play tested out of the game before launch?

[@mrbluebell2735]

Forgot about their character cycling mechanic. That's annoying on top of obnoxious. That's about as anti fun as it can get. Wonder if that cycling algorithm needlessly added to the lobby time for new games. Because when someone drops out, the servers are going to match the player to an available game that has a slot for that particular character. Add waste of time to the fail pile.

[@aravindkm2012]

Probably a feature to ensure none of their self-inserts were ignored.

[@Zepdos]

I used to love Gotham City Imposters, I was right in that age demographic when it came out. Super cool to hear a bit about the background of development. From purely a consumer perspective, I think there is still a space for atypical, non-inspiring, “awkward” character designs in online service games but the problem is that you can’t make your entire cast unappealing and expect to have your game be massively popular. Fantastic video!

[@cybersoldierforever]

When I first saw the trailer, I was like “A guardians of the galaxy ripoff? Never mind.” Then I never hear a word from it again until they announce they are shutting it down.

[@mechanicalmonk2020]

Therein lies the bigger issue than anything else mentioned here. Game got no marketing.

[@nullpoint3346]

@@mechanicalmonk2020 It got a LOT of marketing, nobody wanted it.

[@c0d3warrior]

I'd disagree on the "culture has changed" notion - judging by the current societal climate all over the Western World, I'd say they anticipated a cultural change that never materialised. Concord failed because the culture _didn't_ change.

[@finfrog3237]

The modern audience isn't a marketable demographic. But we'll continue to avoid that elephant in the room it seems xD

[@MarvinPowell1]

They made a game for The "Modern Audience." I _would_ say they all showed up, in the dozens, but most of Concord (and Dustborn's) players were KZbinrs, critics, and streamers mocking the game for content. There were about 3,000 paying customers total, and less than 1,000 playing on their first week. So excluding the cringe-streamers, there quite _literally_ is no modern audience. Everyone who worked on Concord and agreed with its art direction and execution, 100% deserves to lose their job.

[@austinbaccus]

​@@finfrog3237What is the modern audience everyone is referring to?

[@rebel4466]

@c0d3warrior It's a bit of both. The culture changed a bit for a time, but you can see that things are changing. The woker they get, the harder people push back. It's more or less a perspective issue though, not as much about the issue itself

[@rebel4466]

@austinbaccus You should be able to find out your self, just ask them. Can't be more than about 83 people

[@DanLuxe]

One of the things that bothers me is that many talk about is very bad character design, okay, but there were some massive gameplay design issues with this game. SkillUp mentioned this in their review, if anyone wonders, others didn’t.

[@loamymtb]

Love the totalbiscuit clip included, RIP one of the best, still miss those podcasts and reviews. Fantastic video!

[@unpronouncable2442]

0:20 you are missing one more option. They could also not see the issues as issues and be completely delusional in thinking that those are selling points.

[@bendrix1932]

This level of honesty is a wake-up call to developers. I’m looking at you BioWare.

[@MillywiggZ]

With that time and money they could have made a new ‘Infamous’ *and* ‘Prototype’ game.

[@FightCain]

Or killzone

[@Flesh_Wizard]

I'd love a Prototype 3

[@richardbrooks5899]

But those aren't extractive live service games.

[@tfwwhennofitlitgf3300]

so many great 360 era IPs left to rot because of modern game dev's bloated budgets

[@OmegaSpecter87]

Lack of culture. And values. And talent. And vision. And creativity. I can go on.

[@hookflash699]

This is what happens when you hire people based on certain superficial criteria that have nothing to do with talent, vision, creativity, etc.

[@gamesandplanes3984]

Incorrect. This is franjforr school bolshevism through and through.

[@Veylon]

@@hookflash699 The game's director was Ryan Ellis. White dude. Head Designer was Josh Hamrick. White dude. Lead Artist was Adrian Majkrzak. White dude. Writer was James B. Jones. White dude. They definitely had a hiring bias. They only wanted white dudes.

[@mrbluebell2735]

​@@Veylonmakes sense. There's only 1 female coded character in Concord. That's Lark the mushroom with ovipositor. Every other character is a teen male down to their bones in motion capture. Some of the feminine characters (Roka) have bulges in unusual places. All have small mammaries (even Emari). The character designs reek of subversion. On top of the Uncanny Valley effect is a universal sense that something is wrong. It's only in the last week with the characters being broken down and redesigned that it becomes apparent.

[@hookflash699]

@@Veylon Really? Do you honestly believe those guys were hired because they're "white dudes"? And, even if they were, wouldn't that just reinforce my point?

[@itsnessen]

Thank you for making this. I’m not a gamer, and only learned about Concord when it spectacularly failed. I wanted to know *how* such an expensive project could so miss the mark on expected results in the market. Your video is the only one I’ve found that addresses potential issues with company culture, and your experience in the industry offers a lot of credibility. There are valuable lessons here for anyone building something for others, not just video games.

[@brolo7234]

The biggest reasons the game failed imo have absolutely nothing to do with controversy. Most of the people I have played games with didn't even know rhe game existed, let alone was coming out. There was essentially no buzz whatsoever about the game. The other consistent point I found is that everyone took one look at it and said "man im tired of overwatch games" and that was that. People are sick of hero shooters. The time to get in on the craze is gone and every piece of the pie has been snatched up by bigger projects. And that is before getting into the fact that the game itself just doesn't play well or offer anything interesting on its own. Or the development hell spanning multiple years which historically almost always dooms a game. People are just elevating the relevance of its controversy to suit their own personal narrative about politics they don't like. It is completely overinflated and had little to nothing to do with the game's failure. Terminally online need to learn that they are not the majority and know fuck all about anything outside of their brainrot space.

[@jankbunky4279]

Yup, totally! The whole hero shooter thing is past its prime and those who love hero shooters have other options. The popularity of guardians of the galaxy peaked *years* ago. The game's first trailer came out relatively close to release and didn't really make clear what makes this game worth the time and money compared to its competitors. Culture war stuff could maybe end up with a couple less sales, but the majority of people just care about playing a game that looks nice enough and feels good to play. If a game isn't an established name, it needs to introduce itself with clarity and uniqueness though, and Concord did not. What annoys me the most is that Concord isn't even that politically charged? Black and female characters aren't "political". Pronouns aren't "political". The game is 99% just a normal-ass shooting game.

[@Phnxsmv]

The problem is that when you live in your own bubble, you are creating something for people who live in that same bubble. And when you fail because everyone else does not live in your bubble and you still refuse to leave your own bubble, it is no wonder you will want to quit your job and never work in that same job again.

[@fc-vml]

We become more and more connected globally and nevertheless more and more isolated. Quite a societal oxymoron...

[@Rietto]

@@fc-vml Humans naturally want to form tribal cliques. There's nothing wrong with that, IF people also nuture the ability for conflict resolution, respectful exchange of ideas, and flexible thinking. The dark side of tribalism is demonizing 'the Others' and writing them off as irrelevant or unworthy of being engaged with in any constructive way.

[@eqjase]

One of the best, and most professional takes on the Concord I’ve seen. Excellent work.

[@laurafryer6321]

Thank you!

[@josephmarch7142]

Cheers for this. I'm a lead artist at a studio right now, and that's sitting we had to always keep in mind. Target audience. Like real target audience, not ones on social media.

[@lucasLSD]

Like askagamedev said: "80% of players will never engage with anything beyond the game itself. 20% will actually bother to go online and read something about the game, and a mere 5% will be engaged so much as to actually bother to post and communicate with other players." His mistake was thinking every developer cares about data like he does, Concord ones surely didn't.

[@Dawsons_Stuff]

Amazing analysis on broken feedback loops. Was a QA tester for a few games and so many times I’ve seen the same scenario of “Give us feedback!” -> “We’re not looking for negative feedback!” -> They stop listening to QA testers -> Nothing changes, game dies at launch due to failing to adapt and/or too late of a release. Gaming is ALWAYS changing and studios will be forced to adapt to keep up with those changes. What worked a few years ago may not work now yet some developers refuse to change or take constructive feedback. A lot of times I witnessed some testers kicked for playing a competitor’s game despite it bringing insight on what our team could improve on. It’s insane.

[@maxxpower3d6]

Seeing Gotham City Impostors again brought back some nice memories. Loved that game while it lasted. Edit: *and* a TotalBiscuit clip? Oh, the nostalgia.

[@djf881]

Part of the problem here is the very grim and inescapable reality of the marketplace for online multiplayer “live service” games: These games are made to take all your time and, often, all your money. The people who are available for a new live service are the ones who aren’t currently engaged with an existing one, players who are willing to quit the live games they are currently playing, or players with enough free time to add a new one in addition to whatever they are already engaging with. This is a very zero sum marketplace. But I absolutely think the fact that this game put divisive politics front and center in its branding and marketing is a big part of why it failed. The first impression people got of the game was the fact that it had multiple women (including a trans woman) of color among the playable characters and only one racially ambiguous human male character who might be white, Latino or Asian. This sent a message to a large and vital segment of the player base that the game wasn’t for them, and the pronouns for each hero on the character select screen also alienated a big chunk of the player base. This was featured in the first announcement trailers, and this game was known from the very beginning as the pronouns game. Concord’s much discussed miss on character design is also likely related to the political views of the designers. Overwatch characters are very diverse and Overwatch is a pretty woke game, but the characters fit into archetypes and the characters’ designs fit a character fantasy that matches their playstyle. For example, Reaper is an assassin who uses a teleport ability to flank the enemy team, allowing him to do massive damage at close range with his dual shotguns. He wears a skull mask and black tactical gear which creates an aesthetic that matches the mechanics and the fantasy the character represents. He’s also Latino, and that representation is certainly important to a segment of the player base, but it’s not as definitional to the experience of the character as those other things. By contrast, Concord characters like Baz, Daw and Emari seem to exist primarily to represent kinds of people the developers thought were underrepresented. There’s no fantasy associated with playing these characters, and their aesthetics and personalities don’t connect to their gameplay. The first and main thing about Baz is that she a black transgender woman. She uses knives, but she is not about knives the way Reaper is about flanking and shotguns and massive damage. The fantasy she embodies is a black transgender woman as a playable hero in a video game. The other stuff she does is secondary to that representation, and that expresses a deeply held value for the designers that just does not resonate with the audience. It’s possible Firewalk thought there was a huge market of players of color, LGBT gamers and women who felt they were not represented by existing products and were looking for a game that would center and represent them, although that is a weird assumption since there are numerous heroes of color and female heroes in Overwatch, Apex, Valorant and other competing products. But for whatever reason, Firewalk decided to make the wokest game on the market and it became central to their branding and central to how the audience perceived the game. And nobody wanted it.

[@laughingalex7563]

Didnt even olay the game and one look at Baz screams “dumb brute”, and im left thinking of someone who IS known for being a dumb brute on jubilee debates; Blossom, whos know entirely for one line; “never interupt a black trans woman when shes speaking”, the stereotype that black trans women are huge toxic dumb brutes. Baz screams “huge toxic brute”. Not a knife thrower who id expect to be more eloquent. Baz’s legs screams brawler, her jacket profile shadow screams brawler, her face is big and burly, dumb muscle brawler. Hair even “dumb muscle brawler”.

[@theobell2002]

You had me in the first half. The existence of minorities is not political. Only racists and bigots think so.

[@vwyd]

I was expecting some ragebait anti-woke nonsense, but I was very humbled, this might be the most valid "Why Concord fail" video on the whole internet by far

[@Zuzu00000]

It's so ridiculous that some people try to pin "w0ke nOnSeNsE" as the reason this game failed, when Overwatch, the undisputed king of the market Concord was trying to bust into, has been exceedingly diverse since day one. Do they genuinely not have eyes? I feel like I'm going crazy

[@tingle2958]

​@Zuzu00000 to be fair, a game being diverse and being woke are not the same thing. This game was CLEARLY made by woke activists. You can see that immediately at a glance. Putting pronouns in the character selection screen is a pretty obviously controversial decision, regardless of how one personally feels about it. It's going to split your player base. Overwatch had some relatively minor woke elements, Concord absolutely hamfisted it.

[@juandirection8820]

@@Zuzu00000 You feel like you're going crazy because you don't understand the criticism anti-woke people make, and clearly don't want to. The fact you think we're just blanket against diversity shows this. In your head, we think anything that isn't a straight white male is bad. You're going to continue to feel crazy unless you make an honest effort to understand the other side and their criticisms, instead of just screeching racism/phobia/ists etc or mocking us. The people making these games are in the same boat as you, and their games will continue to flop for the same reasons.

[@XanthinZarda]

@@juandirection8820 And more simply, I'd like to posit, "What even is woke", if the same people making that empty claim are also crying about DEI?

[@pfeilspitze]

@@XanthinZarda Woke is just a particular brand of leftist hypocrisy. It's not woke to make a show with an all-female cast, for example, but it *is* woke to talk about how important it is that people see themselves on screen and then complain that men don't watch a show with an all-female cast.

[@kieranhosty]

Thank you Laura! Others have communicated it much better, but your experienced interpretation of current industry events is seriously helpful. I wish I'd gotten recommended content like yours, it's patience like yours that everyone needs

[@takemeseriouslyplx2124]

Gotham city imposters was such a fun game, played it so much when I was younger

[@DumplingDoodle]

the concord grape jelly i bought the day before launch has lasted longer than concord the video game.

[@nicholasadamson2103]

Stuttering Craig sent me here. Great channel 👍

[@timbombadil4046]

It's really quite wild how a hero shooter could launch with such unappealing heroes. The anti-woke narratives are BS, but the designs are bad. So many look like a random option was selected in a robust RPG character creator-- the color schemes are busy and often lack contrast. The design communicates little about the characters. The aliens have faces that are uncannily human. And far too great a portion of the cast feels like they're trying to be the sassy character. In the end people will have spent more time watching videos about Concord than actually had played it. Would it be more or less tragic if the hours spent making it eclipsed both?

[@mrturbo84]

Btw. What i do not get is, why did they not pick up where Blizzard stopped with Overwatch 2. After i heard the Devs would stop development on the PVE and the backlash that followed, i would have talked to my Boss and say hey we should do the PVE Mode... the whole Story Trailer of Concord indicated to me that there would be a Story Mode but was not.

[@AdelaideBen1]

Totally agree... The fundamental premise of the game doesn't fit PVP imo... And I think it would have been better to bake in factions into the experience... Rather than have everyone play the same characters.... Make it feel like you're playing a vibe or style... But the characters just looked universally bland by themselves.

[@mrturbo84]

@@AdelaideBen1 Amen!

[@TravisHi_YT]

They very clearly could not course correct in any way.

[@MajkiBoyVids]

Thank you for the great perspectives you brought with your experience and background. Was a pleasant listen.

[@witchdoctorteepo]

Yes, finally someone explains these points without resorting to saying stupid crap like "The developers were woke." Excellent video!

[@QifanXi]

I'm a developer at a studio with a great feedback culture and one of the things that impressed me the most when I first joined was the engineering and design leadership on my project being willing to accept and respond to feedback from anyone-- the reasoning is that we're making a game for gamers and everyone at the studio is a gamer so your feedback is important. I've seen this culture change and fall off a bit as the team has ballooned in size post-release and because I'm able to contrast the difference over the years, I have to completely agree with you: understanding your audience by playing and loving your competition and fostering a healthy feedback culture to critically assess your own title under development is essential in making a good game.

[@fernandosanchezm]

This channel is awesome, you have a lot of experience to properly analized game problems

[@lono7732]

Hero shooters is the new Clash of Clans reskin hype. Everyone tries to jump on the profit train, while not realizing there is Clash of Clans already, which you will have to compete with.

[@electrified0]

It's absolute insanity that they started development as a competitor to Overwatch and then completely ignored everything that happened around Overwatch 2 - like becoming cross platform and free to play - and everything that happened with games like THE FINALS that failed to carve out a sustainable niche in the genre.

[@Ozzianman]

Uhhh, what? According to SteamDB, The Finals is currently hovering around 16k players and that is just Steam. It is not even a hero shooter like Overwatch. If I absolutely have to make a comparison, I would rather compare it to TF2 since The Finals actually have some overlap with that game in regards to tools and weapons. That game has it's niche, being a objective based arena shooter with destructible environments. It is still getting updated and the developers are actively asking for feedback from players.

[@changen4125]

@@Ozzianman the finals was a fucking insanely good game in terms of gunplay and movement, and then they refused to rebalance stuff. It took me 2 games of getting nuked to uninstall it as it made 2 out of 3 classes completely unusable. It took them like 2 month to rebalance while they were bleeding players. Why should I play against noob tubes in the finals when I can just do that in COD.

[@Ozzianman]

@@changen4125 Not an issue anymore, all clases are viable and recent updates have had generally good changes.

[@Hydrodictyon]

@@Ozzianman finals started out with 250k and failed to keep even 10% if that around, you call that a success? If so, than helldivers 2 aren’t failing as well then

[@Ozzianman]

@@Hydrodictyon Yes, the vast majority of live service games lose most of their starting playerbase. People do indeed play different games, people move on to different games. The few live service games that are able to retain numbers close to or higher than they started with is an anomaly. Consider this: The game is getting updated. The game is getting new content. This means the game is at the very least, profittable. Helldivers 2 is also alive with currently 17k players on Steam. I would be very interested to know what the monthly unique player count is for both of those games as that would give us a good estimate for active player population. A game is only dead when it can not be played anymore. If you want to see failures, there are Concord and Lawbreakers.

[@DeltaV64]

Thanks to this video, I found this channel. Every video is packed with amazing wisdom and experience.

[@cikame]

There's a lot of assumptions about what kinds of characters gamers like to play as, but you don't need to assume as it's all out there to see, people are online talking about their favourite characters, loads of games have character creators, there's thousands of artists on Xitter and other sites, cosplayers, can also just look at game sales... To endeavour to create something people don't like is a bold move, if the idea was to challenge expectations i guess they succeeded.

[@Edheldui]

I was 14 when Gotham City Impostors came out, i absolutely loved it and you'll find the same sentiment every time that game is brought up in a discussion.

[@DanteKG.]

Woah... I thought this was a video done by another internet critic and then I heard "I joined Vanguard as a Microsoft executive producer at the same time I started on Gears of War".... Its always facinating to hear devs talk about the industry of their own accord on their personal social media(i guess the biggest name recently would be Thor of Pirate Software) but its super rare to see that from such a higher position like an executive producer. Oh this is gonna be fun! And insightful! Time to subscribe :D

[@laurafryer6321]

Thanks for subscribing!!

[@jimjam5012]

When you listen to a small bunch of terminally online Twitter users and game journalists, your game will completely miss who the actual audience should be.

[@moeezS]

3:50 This is a dubious far-right source being used, which isn't even doing the report, it's taking bits from a far-right gaming KZbinr called Smash JT. And the culture that they claim about Firewalk is just unsubstantiated stuff about pronouns. Nothing in That Park Place's "report" speaks to studio culture in regards to player feedback, feedback loops, or creative dialogue. Aside from this dubious far-right source that has an anti-SJW agenda, the rest of this video has some good insights using her personal experience with Vanguard and Gotham City Impostors and what their failures can mean.

[@BigWheel.]

"Everyone who disagrees with my worldview is far right"

[@capothefool]

if this is what playing videogames has come to i might sell everyrhing and leave right now.

[@kugiuk]

People don’t need propaganda to despise sjw culture

[@fakkel321]

Found your channel recently. Amazing content. So refreshing to have a DEV giving us some inside and understanding. Also thank you for Gears of War and Crimson Skies. Prob my most played xbox games.

[@ToastyCubes]

I love how efficient and matter-of-fact this is, not sensationalized to hell and back like most other videos about the game.

[@sanji1259]

see, we gamers aren´t against women in gaming development, we all would want HER! to be part of our next game

[@math925]

This was such a fascinating video. I really love how you tied so many lessons back to personal experience and provided examples from history. It was so cool watching stories from your career as a developer. I could not hit "subscribe" hard enough.

[@laurafryer6321]

Thank you for the sub! I'm glad you enjoyed the video!

[@albiceleste101]

I'm glad this experiment was made so certain radical groups stop shaming devs for making badass/hot looking characters

[@mainstreetsaint36]

So instead of the game as it is: Hot characters, still stale gameplay?

[@lucasLSD]

@@mainstreetsaint36 that's the catch 22 reviewers put themselves in, they all say the gunplay is good, that it is a good game, so by that logic the game can only fail because of it's designs.

[@richardbrooks5899]

You really have no clue do you?

[@Dr._Nicolas]

we are not even mad at the devs, we are happy that these game fail because of its model and philosophy, is not our responsibility to keep the jobs of someone, we are not goin to play something that we don't want just because they tell us.

[@jaybeetdown]

I like the format of this video and your voice is easy to listen to.

[@NoMadKid]

Concord pros: Polished and looks great. Cons: Uninspired design and redundant.

[@mechanicalmonk2020]

Hey now you can't be saying this kind of stuff. You have to say in no uncertain terms that every single thing about that game was bad

[@mrbluebell2735]

​@@mechanicalmonk2020nah, this nails it accurately. Will have to give the mechanics of the game its due. It plays adequately, is free of egregious bugs and has a competent physics model. Unfortunately, it's washed over by lots of beige and ochre. Overall, the bones of the game is overshadowed by poor taste.

[@PherPhur]

@@mrbluebell2735 That and the fact it's a hero shooter that chose to lean more into the FPS side of things. Hero shooters became popular because people have been playing FPS after FPS for 20 years. The fundamental of an FPS, the skill shots and the competitive nature are what people came back for, but the rest was getting old. Concord looks like it's basically Halo with map items as static loadouts. bleh

[@anecro]

Not even remotely close to "looks great", I don't think I've seen an uglier game the past 5 years. Completely missed that one unless you're talking about how real the graphics look, which is still an average "meh" by today's standards. Have you seen Space Marine 2? That's good graphics

[@roozbeh6999]

> looks great huh ?

[@krylotik]

The "demands to be called professor" thing is wild

[@edubs9828]

I forgot about that! lol

[@shibumi8]

Very informative. No wonder things fell apart, they created their own echo chamber. Also didn’t know about Gotham City Imposters, sounds like you had a blast working on it.

[@SarahC2]

Prof "Proffesor" Wertle (not a professor) was likely the worst loud/brash/bully in the team and pushed their politics into the game hard. Very forthright in their need to get unva-d fired, you can imagine the burnt-earth effect she had on everyone's feedback about the game. I do wonder occasionally just how much "community" in the office was damaged by just this one person?

[@someguy5035]

This phenomenon happens everywhere. Coporate, military, small business. And to be frank, the worst leaders/mangers I ever worked with/for were women. They took everything personally and behaved like tantrum-throwing children.