Hero shooter Highguard lands on Steam with 74% negative reviews

Today's the day! It's Highguard day! Against all odds and the apparent disappearance of its dev team, Highguard — the world's most generic-looking hero shooter — has finally descended from on high. It even came with a new trailer that puts a better foot forward than its disastrous showing at The Game Awards.

At least this one actually shows off its unique selling points: phase-based gameplay, destruction, and reinforcement of the environment. The team at Wildlight is going to have to put together something tremendous to get over that initial reveal; getting on the biggest stage in gaming and falling flat on your face isn't something you bounce back from easily.

According to initial impressions, it has a long way to go. Highguard currently sits at a "Mostly Negative" rating on Steam, with 74% of reviews recommending against it. Most complaints target poor optimization (welcome to gaming in the 2020s) and unpolished visuals leaning heavily on AI resolution upscaling and frame-generative tools like DLSS. There's plenty of criticism of the game's structure, too, with the most common being that its expansive maps and extended, multi-stage matches don't make sense for a strict 3v3 format.

One particular review by Steam user Rounderhouse resonates: "I mostly just feel bad for the devs. The game clearly wasn't designed or prepared for this level of scrutiny."

Indeed, it's come out since that disastrous TGA reveal that Wildlight didn't initially ask for the showcase or pay for it — host Geoff Keighley just liked what he'd seen that much. If that had never happened, Highguard likely would have lived and died as one of a thousand anonymous Overwatch competitors instead of being crucified by the gaming community. The point of a crucifixion is spectacle, though, isn't it? In the days ahead, Highguard has a chance to prove there's no such thing as negative attention.

Oh, but I didn't play it myself, because it installs multiple layers of kernel-level DRM. Screw that.

Previously:
• Highguard is a week away and the devs are dead silent
• No, you didn't get Titanfall 3, but at least you got something worse
• Fans bring back Sony's $400 million gaming disaster from the dead