TheRetroArcade
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Posts: 1,971
Joined: Feb 2026
Joined: Feb 2026
Highguard was not a dead game, it's being murdered.
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Welcome to FOV 90, an FPS column from staff writer Morgan Park. Every other week, I cover topics relevant to first-person shooter enjoyers, spanning everything from multiplayer and singleplayer to the old and the new.
Wildlight Entertainment announced today that Highguard is shutting down on March 12. Servers will go offline just 45 days after they went online, cementing the 3v3 "raid shooter" as another live service boondoggle.
I won't relitigate the noxious cloud of internet that surrounded Highguard, because ultimately, premature "hate playing" is not the reason it's going away. Highguard is shutting down because live service games are not allowed to be unpopular.
It's important to establish that Highguard had fans. Thousands of people were playing it—its regular concurrents hung around 400 on Steam and at least double that on PS5, according to game director Chad Grenier. Remember, peak concurrents are not a measure of how many total people played a game that day—that number is usually much higher but never public.
For a brand new studio making its first game, I'd say that's pretty good. Highguard wasn't popular, but neither are dozens of multiplayer shooters that've stuck around for years. This pattern of games shutting down just days, weeks, or months after they debut is still a very recent, ugly phenomenon. It's one thing to stop actively developing an FPS with a small audience and move on to greener pastures. It's another to throw it away like it was trash.
To treat this like it's normal is to let the morons who make these calls off the hook. In this case, Tencent was reportedly Wildlight's big backer that immediately cut off funding when it wasn't a hit. It should be galactically embarrassing for these suits to display such a dearth of belief or awareness in what they were helping create.
At what point did these moneymen really think they were funding the next Apex Legends? Did they not hear the same pitch I did from Wildlight in January? It's an FPS centered around Capture the Flag that morphs into Rainbow Six lite every five minutes. It has "cool, but obviously niche" written all over it.
It's on Wildlight, too. Not the frontline developers who made a well-constructed FPS that, despite its complexity, played great—but the leadership that built a 100+-person team on terms that ha...Read more: Full article on www.pcgamer.com
What do you think about this?
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Every Friday
GamesRadar+
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Every Thursday
GTA 6 O'clock
Our special GTA 6 newsletter, with breaking news, insider info, and rumor analysis from the award-winning GTA 6 O'clock experts.
Every Friday
Knowledge
From the creators of Edge: A weekly videogame industry newsletter with analysis from expert writers, guidance from professionals, and insight into what's on the horizon.
Every Thursday
The Setup
Hardware nerds unite, sign up to our free tech newsletter for a weekly digest of the hottest new tech, the latest gadgets on the test bench, and much more.
Every Wednesday
Switch 2 Spotlight
Sign up to our new Switch 2 newsletter, where we bring you the latest talking points on Nintendo's new console each week, bring you up to date on the news, and recommend what games to play.
Every Saturday
The Watchlist
Subscribe for a weekly digest of the movie and TV news that matters, direct to your inbox. From first-look trailers, interviews, reviews and explainers, we've got you covered.
Once a month
SFX
Get sneak previews, exclusive competitions and details of special events each month!
Welcome to FOV 90, an FPS column from staff writer Morgan Park. Every other week, I cover topics relevant to first-person shooter enjoyers, spanning everything from multiplayer and singleplayer to the old and the new.
Wildlight Entertainment announced today that Highguard is shutting down on March 12. Servers will go offline just 45 days after they went online, cementing the 3v3 "raid shooter" as another live service boondoggle.
I won't relitigate the noxious cloud of internet that surrounded Highguard, because ultimately, premature "hate playing" is not the reason it's going away. Highguard is shutting down because live service games are not allowed to be unpopular.
It's important to establish that Highguard had fans. Thousands of people were playing it—its regular concurrents hung around 400 on Steam and at least double that on PS5, according to game director Chad Grenier. Remember, peak concurrents are not a measure of how many total people played a game that day—that number is usually much higher but never public.
For a brand new studio making its first game, I'd say that's pretty good. Highguard wasn't popular, but neither are dozens of multiplayer shooters that've stuck around for years. This pattern of games shutting down just days, weeks, or months after they debut is still a very recent, ugly phenomenon. It's one thing to stop actively developing an FPS with a small audience and move on to greener pastures. It's another to throw it away like it was trash.
To treat this like it's normal is to let the morons who make these calls off the hook. In this case, Tencent was reportedly Wildlight's big backer that immediately cut off funding when it wasn't a hit. It should be galactically embarrassing for these suits to display such a dearth of belief or awareness in what they were helping create.
At what point did these moneymen really think they were funding the next Apex Legends? Did they not hear the same pitch I did from Wildlight in January? It's an FPS centered around Capture the Flag that morphs into Rainbow Six lite every five minutes. It has "cool, but obviously niche" written all over it.
It's on Wildlight, too. Not the frontline developers who made a well-constructed FPS that, despite its complexity, played great—but the leadership that built a 100+-person team on terms that ha...Read more: Full article on www.pcgamer.com
What do you think about this?