Highguard dies tomorrow, 12th March. A combination of misguided design decisions, online vitriol, and a shocking lack of post-launch runway have doomed Wildlight Entertainment’s hero shooter to disappear just one and a half months after its launch. As the dust settles, more devs are opening up about the rollercoaster ride that was the game’s development and release, as some have even had time to reflect on recent mistakes.
At least that’s what Josh Sobel, technical artist and rigger, has revealed with his new post on X/Twitter after disappearing for a month following an outburst against online grifters and the push of narratives that made Highguard instantly go “downhill” after the initial reveal. While he says he stands “by the intent behind much of what I said,” he admits it was all phrased “poorly” and as the result of difficult circumstances. Here’s the 10th March post:
Sobel acknowledges “there were a lot of elements involved” in the downfall of the game (and you know this is true if you’ve been following the whole saga), but, if you ask me, he’s right to point out the external forces that always rooted for the game to fail, well before we had access to the thing and evaluated what it actually was. The rest of his (now deleted) original comments and the tone employed are up for debate, yes, but he admits he “was stressed, devastated, angry, and running on 2hrs sleep.”
In any case, Highguard is the latest victim in a long line of short-lived trend-chasing shooters trying to break into an over-crowded market. If you fancy a few final games before Highguard is turned off forever, you can still jump in today to play with the content update the remaining developers knocked out last week.
