What should have been a seemingly innocent game reveal at The Game Awards 2025 has turned into an interesting case study in video game marketing. Highguard was the final announcement at The Game Awards 2025, a PvP raid shooter that landed with a bit of a whimper for the millions who watched The Game Awards. While many believed it was a disappointing announcement to end the show, some wanted to give Highguard the benefit of the doubt, especially since it showed limited gameplay. Things got weird, though, as developer Wildlight Entertainment stayed relatively quiet following the game’s debut at The Game Awards 2025.
At one point, some wondered whether or not the game was actually going to release on January 26. Well, that day is today, and the team has shared a showcase that details Highguard’s gameplay. Turns out, a game from developers who worked on Apex Legends ends up following in its footsteps. Highguard is a 3v3 PvP raid shooter where players team up, secure their base, and then ride out across the land to loot, harvest resources, and upgrade their arsenal.
The game’s heroes are called Wardens, who wield guns and raid tools, along with rare magical abilities. The idea is to battle for possession of the legendary Shieldbreaker in the open field, which can be used to bring down the shields at the enemy’s base in order to raid it and destroy it, before they can destroy yours.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the game is already getting review bombed on Steam. At the time of writing, it sits with an Overwhelmingly Negative rating after getting over 2,500 reviews in all languages. Many are complaining about the game’s 3v3 format on such a large map, and poor optimization on PC. Still, it has clearly garnered some interest, as it did reach a peak concurrent player count of 97,249. It has fallen since then, though, and is currently sitting at over 73,000.
We likely won’t have time to check out Highguard, especially since we’re pretty tired of these types of games. The premise is interesting, but it doesn’t sound like there’s enough to make it unique or compelling. Best of luck to the team, though, because it sounds like they’ll need it.
