Sony has shut down two PlayStation studios including Concord developer Firewalk Studios
Neon Koi is also no more
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Sonyhas closed two PlayStation developers, Neon Koi, andConcorddeveloper Firewalk Studios. The news was confirmed in an internal email from Sony CEO Hermen Hulst that was subsequentlyshared to the official Sony blog.
The email states that the company seeks to “consistently evaluate our games portfolio and status of our projects to ensure we are meeting near and long-term business priorities.” The decision to close the two studios reportedly arose from “ongoing efforts to strengthen” the business.
Neon Koi was working on an unannounced mobile action game, which the statement confirms will “not be moving forward” at this time.
Firewalk Studios has been shuttered as a result of the poor reception of its debut titleConcord, which was released back in August. The game had been in development for eight years and was shut downjust two weeks after launch, with refunds given to affected players.
In a SeptemberPlayStation blog post, game director Ryan Ellis said that the studio would “explore options, including those that will better reach our players” - potentially suggesting a future relaunch. Now we know that this will not be the case as this latest communication states that “after much thought, we have determined the best path forward is to permanently sunset the game and close the studio”.
The email then goes on to say that Sony “will take the lessons learned fromConcordand continue to advance our live service capabilities to deliver future growth in this area.” This could indicate that there are even more live-service projects on the horizon.
Firewalk Studios has since shared a goodbye message onsocial media, “signing off one last time” and praising the team’s “truly world-class” talent.
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There is no official word on the number of staff affected by this decision, though a newreport by Bloombergclaims that a total of 210 people will be losing their jobs across both Neon Koi and Firewalk Studios.
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Dash is a technology journalist who covers gaming hardware at TechRadar. Before joining the TechRadar team, he was writing gaming articles for some of the UK’s biggest magazines including PLAY, Edge, PC Gamer, and SFX. Now, when he’s not getting his greasy little mitts on the newest hardware or gaming gadget, he can be found listening to J-pop or feverishly devouring the latest Nintendo Switch otome.
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