By Feedback from pre-alpha test was very poor
- by Sammy Barker
Fairgames – formerly known as Fairgame$, of course – was announced alongside Sony’s disastrous first-person shooter Concord, as part of the firm’s wider live service push.
However, recently we heard that developer Haven Studios’ founder Jade Raymond – a Ubisoft veteran who played a pivotal role in the early success of Assassin’s Creed – had departed the company following a round of bad feedback.
And now, courtesy of the latest episode of PlayStation podcast Sacred Symbols (paywalled), more information about the project is beginning to trickle out.
Apparently, a pre-alpha was distributed via PSN under the name Project Hearts, enabling a small number of participants to go hands-on with the game.
According to one of those people, it’s a “Battle Royale crossed with an extraction shooter”, with elements of both Fortnite and The Division present.
If you remember the original trailer, it had a contemporary Robin Hood vibe to it, as squads of fashionable rogues robbed from the rich.
Apparently, the game sees you dropped into a large urban environment in teams of three to four, and tasks you with stealing from vaults while other groups of players attempt to do the same.
In other words, it sounds like yet another extraction shooter, similar to the uber-popular Escape from Tarkov or Sony subsidiary Bungie’s Marathon.
But apparently the game doesn’t feel good to play and it’s “super clunky” in its current guise, which reflects what Bloomberg wrote in its report on Raymond’s departure. The feedback to the release has not been good.
Sony’s said that it remains committed to Haven Studios under new leadership, of course, but it’s been four years since the team was founded and more than two years since it was acquired outright.
Once again, it paints a very precarious picture of the platform holder’s live service push. With the plug pulled on Concord in unprecedented circumstances, and many of its online projects cancelled behind closed doors, the company will understandably be feeling skittish about whatever it puts out next.
The future of Fairgames, we suspect, is dangling by a thread.
[source patreon.com]
As the Editor of Push Square, Sammy has over 15 years of experience analysing the world of PlayStation, from PS3 through PS5 and everything in between. He’s an expert on PS Studios and industry matters, as well as sports games and simulators. He also enjoys RPGs when he has the time to dedicate to them, and is a bit of a gacha whale.