PlayStation’s new online FPS won’t have a battle pass because “you own Concord, Concord doesn’t own you”

PlayStation’s upcoming FPS Concord won’t have a battle pass because the developers want a complete experience on day one.

In case you hadn’t noticed, paid battle passes have become ubiquitous in the online shooter realm, but in an FAQ shared to Twitter, developer Firewalk Studios explained why it’s bucking tradition with the Sony-published Concord.

“Concord does not have a battle pass,” Firewalk said. “We wanted to focus our attention on making Concord a rewarding and robust experience on day one, where just playing the game, leveling up your accounts and characters, and completing jobs yields meaningful rewards.”

While there will be post-release content including seasons, it’ll all be available to players at no additional cost. “We’ll be diving deeper into our post-launch roadmap very soon – stay tuned,” Firewalk said.

In a follow-up tweet, Concord gameplay animation director Mark DeRidder took an even more explicit stance against battle passes, emphasizing, “No Battle Pass, folks. You own Concord, Concord doesn’t own you.”

This pre-release messaging is likely to resonate with world-weary FPS fans who’ve become acclimated to paid battle passes and online games that feel incomplete at launch, but it remains to be seen whether Concord, which releases on August 23 for PS5 and PC, is going to stick the landing. We spent some time with the recently concluded open beta for our Concord preview and found it to be a “really fun arena shooter” that isn’t “necessarily rewriting the rulebook, but offering appealing enough play to eat away evenings with ease.”

Reactions to the open beta more broadly have been generally positive, enough so that Overwatch senior animator Kyle Disanjh called the hero shooter “a great surprise so far,” with “distinct” characters and “fast and kinetic” combat.

Now’s not a bad time to familiarize yourself with the Concord character tier list.