I Fell In Love With Highguard And Now It’s Gone Forever

Highguard looked bland, sounded bland, and after my first 30 minutes I still wasn’t convinced it didn’t feel bland. I stuck with it, though: I played a couple dozen hours with friends and fell in love. Wildlight Entertainment’s ill-fated multiplayer shooter goes offline today forever; in just three months the game went from closing out the 2026 Game Awards to being nicknamed “Concord 2.0.” The vibes surrounding Highguard were rancid from the jump, but the vibes in the PS5 party chat where I played with two close friends were terrific.

The things that turned some players off were precisely what kept me sticking around: it’s slow to play, confusing to understand, and broadly pretty devoid of swagger. That lack of spark made Highguard my perfect late-night chillout. I thought of it as the gaming equivalent of my go-to light, cheap beer—Yuengling, PRB, Narragansett—familiar and low-commitment.

The looting phase was undercooked, yet I grew fond of the rush to loot chests and bash crystals while vying over the Shieldbreaker spawn point.

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