I think it's fairly safe to say that Concord will go down in history as the biggest flop or at least up there with some of the all-time terrible games ever made but just a day after Sony announced that they're closing down Concord and retooling it do we hear about their next big game as a service called fair games and how this game doesn't look much different or any better than the situation Concord was in what's going on guys welcome to another episode of Smash JT and fair games is the next game game that could be ending up costing Sony Millions upon millions and hundreds of millions of dollars in Failure if this does not work out but I don't know I kind of want to give this one a chance because Concord was just over-the-top Dei and ugly characters and stupid stuff that no one wanted and games that already existed that were doing it better for free nobody would want to purchase Concord surely fair games isn't going to fall for that same problem oh damn it JT hit that subscribe give me a like and check out smj t.com for the full article talking about how fair games looks to be the next gigantic failure coming out of Sony Sony announced a game called fair games and it's developed by a company called haven Studios promising a fresh and modern Take On The Heist genre you know a game that we haven't played before a million times already okay whatever I'm listening the games creative director Matthew leuk is enthusiastic of course about his new IP claiming that it offers a thrilling and competitive Heist experience and a window into different subcultures of society and right there it's like whoa hit the brakes what I'm not playing games for finding out about subcultures and Society I play games to have fun with them like holy crap how is that one of the first things that comes out of this guy's mouth when talking about a game it looks like fair games is yet another misguided attempt by Sony to jump on that ever lucrative games as a surface model just like they did with Concord and failed miserably but who knows you know you put enough eggs and separate them in different baskets maybe one of them will turn into something special and then you watch this and it feels like another antifa simulator what's the deal with that fair games has been marketed as a game where players join an underground movement to rob the ultra Rich aiming to rebalance the scales in the modern-day Robin Hood style that it is but come on using that old narrative quickly feels worn out and toned deaf the whole Eat the Rich thing has been so overplayed especially coming from a corporation like Sony where like any other big business they aim to make as much money as possible with this game and they're trying to tell the players like oh yeah get back of those rich people by buying our content and DLC and season passes that'll really show those rich people who's boss they keep comparing comp the game to the Robin Hood narrative and it makes no sense the Robin Hood stole from the rich to give to the poor not to enrich himself in Fair games the players's goal is to seek personal enrichment filling their pockets like a kid in a candy store making as much money as possible there's a fundamental contradiction in the game's premise that makes it feel more like a disingenuous cash grab than a meaningful commentary on wealth inequality and again we step out of this and say what do we even doing here we're putting like real world politics injecting narratives into these games and then trying to make the player feel like they're doing something righteous almost like taking over and fighting back against the ultra wealthy and using antifa style tactics to take them down what are we trying to teach people why are we trying to indoctrinate people with this type of tactic over and over and over again it seems and that's what I keep going back to when I watch these trailers one of the most glaring issues with fair games is the attempt to go out of its way to a appeal to this genen Z audience and potentially even the modern Audience by employing the cool and edgy Aesthetics the game's trailer is filled with characters sporting exaggerated trendy hairstyles and flashy outfits clearly aiming for that younger crowd but the problem here is that these superficial efforts appearing to be hip feel incredibly forced and are pandering instead of creating something genuinely fresh and exciting fair games looks to be just a desperate attempt to chase another trend just like Concord did when they tried to steal customers from blizzard and OverWatch it didn't work now the biggest take back from Concord is they were trying to charge $40 for that experience but still there was an established brand and property that already did this and they were trying to get some of that pie now this feels more like a fortnite style mixed with payday it's the same old formula that we've seen countless other games as Services titles trying to emulate with fortnite success but Sony's fan base has repeatedly expressed a preference for more grounded realistic experiences like Killzone resistance or Socom or even more of the Fantasy Realm where it's the last of us or Spider-Man but Gamers of Sony don't want a game as a service title and that's the problem Sony's seeing all this money being made everywhere else and they're like we need to get part of that pie we need to make games that are taking the gamers away from those so we get some of that money instead of having a great idea for a game first and then saying it naturally fits a game as a service model they are now trying to go out of their way with they okay what's been done before how can we turn this into a model and make money off of going forward Sony's biggest problem here is making the same mistake with fair games as they did with Concord basically making a Payday clone and pushing it as a game as a service model on an audience that doesn't want to play this kind of game and sure maybe people will be like oh it's at least different it's a new IP I'll give it a shot I don't know about you guys but checking social media and what people think about this it's anything but positive right now take for example a game like Grand Theft Auto 5 where they added in Grand Theft Auto online afterwards and it was a successful singleplayer experience that naturally LED itself to a world that had a multiplayer experience that people wanted to participate in it was just like a natural flow of evolution of Gamers we're like I like this game it's a fun experience I would like to play this game online with other people oh good now that's an option for me I will give you my money and you have a transaction of services and now we have games like Sony that's like oh you guys pay money for online all right we'll give you all the online you can handle Sony could have easily taken a similar approach with The Last of Us Part two factions having a multiplayer mode added on to the game that already existed but no that's likely ending up cancelled and Sony instead is insistent on pushing a narrative that they're core fan base has shown little interest in a flashy cartoony game as a service with cringeworthy anti- capitalistic narratives what's next a game called fight the patrio I mean I kid but then you go to their website and I'm wondering you know is sweet baby Inc or any of these diversity consultant firms involved with them because it seems a little sketch with this antifa injection in the trailer that I'm watching and I see in the hiring area that of course first you apply have a look look at our amazing careers and find one that appeals to you then send us a resume we encourage everyone interested to apply even if you're missing a few qualifications diversity equity and inclusion are fundamental to our values that right there should tell you all you need to know about what this game company stands for and we truly believe the best people come from all sorts of backgrounds and while I couldn't specifically find a consultancy firm that they work with just watching the trailer and then pairing it with what their job application says it makes you feel very uncomfortable when it comes to this studio what's interesting to note about fair games is how Sony and Haven Studios have not given an update in a year since this CGI trailer dropped there's been no gameplay footage no information no updates and most most importantly no release date and it makes you wonder is Sony internally holding everything up pulling the range back saying we put the cart before the horse with Concord we cannot afford to do that again here with fair games so we need to put this game on ice right now especially because the whole Dei thing is clearly impacting the sales of games and we cannot afford to risk it honestly that's what I feel like is happening here even though gamer ranks has an article saying that there's a rumor that internal chatter in Sony is fairly positive for fair games I would cast doubt on that because honestly everything that's been happening it would make no sense for Sony to feel this way plus you pair that with how Concord faltered so badly and how much money they lost on that they wouldn't be able to make such a gigantic risk again falling for basically the same exact thing they did with Concord fair games has not gotten a good reception from anyone and as push Square called it it looks like generic Ubisoft fodder and Sony's most toned deaf PS5 PC title to date which is saying something fair games is shaping up to be yet another massive disaster for Sony much like Concord the game's worn out narrative forced Aesthetics and a toned deaf approach make it hard to see it becoming anything other than a flop and how much money is Sony going to lose before they get through their head the games that we actually want to play from them great enriching single player experiences that do not inject Dei into the game play it's really not that hard if you need an example please go ahead and look at game Sciences black myth Wukong or many other great game experiences that are out there that are single player and not force diversity that's what Gamers want they don't want politics injected into their games they don't want antifa simulators they don't want you to tell them how they should feel about taking money and trying to take from the rich they just want to play a game at the end of the day that's really all it comes down to anyways I'm going to leave it there if you guys want more information check out smj t.com for the full article if you appreciate what I'm doing please consider hitting that join button thank you so much for watching and as always you stay smashing I you know I've done a lot of talking to different developers about their experience you know working with different um different Publishers and Sony does stand out as being um a company that really understands the creative process and and developing games and supports the dev teams and gives them the autonomy they need so so that was a big [Music] attractor [Music] smash smash SM