It’s not necessarily news to say that Highguard has a lot working against it in the court of public opinion. While the game is developed by veterans who worked on Titanfall and Apex Legends, its announcement trailer, which closed out The Game Awards, seems to have done more harm than good in building hype for the free-to-play shooter.
The problem for newcomer Wildlight Entertainment is that the game is set to launch in three weeks as of this writing, and the studio’s silence seems to be only further pushing many gamers’ fears that Highguard may release to no fanfare at all.
Highguard has Gone Completely Silent Before Launch
Essentially, from the moment Highguard was revealed, many people online began criticizing the game for various reasons. Some called it generic, while others pointed out that another live service hero shooter was not a good choice to be the show-ending announcement for The Game Awards. Some have even pointed out that the name Highguard is derivative of Overwatch.
That all happened on December 11. As of January 5, the game’s official Twitter account has yet to post anything since that night, and the studio’s account hasn’t said anything outside of mourning the loss of Vince Zampella, who tragically died in a Ferrari crash over the winter break and had worked with many of the team.
That silence has had some people taking to social media to voice their concerns for the game. Even those that are interested in the game are pointing out that they don’t know enough about the game. There’s been no exploration of various maps, no showcase of the character roster, and not an explanation of the game modes and objectives.
Can Highguard Turn This Around?
Really, the Highguard silence wouldn’t be a problem for a game that was set to release much later. It would make sense for the team to go completely quiet to settle down the noise, but for a game that is releasing later this month and needs as much good word of mouth as possible to drum up any excitement, it’s definitely an interesting move.
The question becomes how can Highguard better sell itself to players before launch? In our opinion, a lot of this could be solved by a deep dive video from the team showing where the game differs from Destiny, Overwatch, Apex Legends, Concord, Call of Duty, Fortnite, and Valorant. The reveal trailer showed a couple of interesting aspects but didn’t go far enough with them. Otherwise, the only way to change people’s minds is for them to actually play it, and a surprise beta doesn’t seem to be in the works.
As of now, Highguard seems to be putting all of its fate and future on the hopes that some goodwill of mouth at launch will get people more interested. That feels like a big gamble right now, but maybe they could be right, and all of this current worry is just noise from an industry that is traumatized by so many bad stories in recent years.
