Highguard was recently taken offline for good, and now it looks like the studio behind it may be following suit. Wildlight Entertainment has gone AWOL from the internet, with its website down and the studio's LinkedIn page nowhere to be seen. Should this be the end of Wildlight, I can't help but feel sorry for the devs affected.
As spotted by MP1st, trying to find Wildlight's LinkedIn now yields a 'this LinkedIn page isn't available' message. Likewise, the Wildlight website now meets you with a 404 error. It's an unceremonious finale, but I feel that, given the huge amount of backlash both Highguard and the studio behind the FPS game has received, it's a kindness.
Highguard reached the end of service last week. Its downfall was swift and ruthless, after failing to captivate its audience sufficiently for it to stick around. Part-hero shooter, part-battle royale - heck, even part-rhythm game, with its oddly-placed mining mechanic - it was a real mish-mash, repackaged as a 'raid shooter.' It was, unfortunately, a flawed and oftentimes confusing experience, and lead designer Alex Graner said it leant "too far" into high-level competitive gameplay. While I was disgusted by the vitriol spewed by players praying for its downfall, there was a fair share of valid criticism mixed in. The people had made up their minds, and with player counts plummeting, Highguard was ostensibly doomed.
Just over two weeks after Highguard launched, Wildlight laid off most of its staff. With only a skeleton crew left to keep things ticking over, the remaining devs did their best to make good on some of the content promised in Wildlight's roadmap. Raid Rush was a massive improvement over the standard 3v3 offering, cutting out the looting phase that killed much of the momentum. It also introduced a 5v5 format, which began to help fill out some of the space on Highguard's comparatively oversized maps.
Even then, this wasn't enough to turn the tide. On March 3, Wildlight announced that Highguard was shutting down completely. Now, with a near-empty studio and no sign of any new projects waiting in the wings, it seemed inevitable that Wildlight would shutter too. Judging from this latest bit of news, it looks like it might just be doing that. It's a tremendous shame that things haven't panned out, and I hope that, if this is the case, the devs find new homes soon.