It feels anticlimactic to say so, and I don’t know why Geoff likes it so much, but Highguard seems decent. Adequate. S’alright. It’s a fine competitive FPS that’s capable of producing spirited, back-and-forth gun battles between spec ops wizards on bearback, which can in turn tickle the itches of anyone burnt out on battle royales or exasperated with extraction shooters. That’s me. I’m talking about me.
Not that Highguard doesn’t do its own share of cribbing from the hits. If anything, each round of its sole mode, Raid, proceeds like you’re scrolling through the different genre sections (and sometimes, specific games) on Steam. First, there’s a minute or so where you and two teammates reinforce the walls of your base, Rainbow Six Siege style. Then instead of instant bloodbathing, both teams spend a few minutes searching the map’s loot crates and mineral deposits for money and gear upgrades – a peculiar blend of Borderlands and early-game MOBA farming. Fights only break out when a magic sword unlocks somewhere on the map, prompting a spin on Capture the Flag where one blade carrier is escorted to the other team’s base so they can plunge it into the enemy’s shield generator, summoning a massive sci-fantasy battering ram. Once that punches through the barrier, it goes all Counter-Strike, the attacking team (who suddenly ‘gain’ limited lives) try to plant bombs on all the important base bits.
Depending on how many generators get wrecked in a base push, literally all of that can repeat multiple times per game, which – god help me – is something I actually like. Sub-10 minute deathrolls only happen occasionally, so more often than not, you’re regularly getting either the relief of a quiet buildup phase after the stress of a successful attack, or a chance to reset and rearm after losing a chunk of base health. Recurring engagements with the same small team is also conducive to rivalry-building, in a way that the one-and-done wiping of BRs and extraction shooters is not, and Highguard’s guns have enough percussive, metallic banginess to them that those duels are usually snappy and satisfying. Provided, at least, you keep your shooters upgraded enough to counter the rapid beefing-up of personal shields.
At its best, Highguard is also subtly effective at recreating the best bits of its myriad inspirations. For me, the highlights tend to be matches that have the feel of a great Dota 2 game: involving and demanding of attention, where enduring the momentum of an apparently superior team opens up chances to turn the tables, be it through sheer grit or the perfectly-timed deployment of magic skills.
When not at its best, though, Highguard does lack a safety net of unique qualities. You may, for instance, have already been left staring blankly at its almost indescribably bland aesthetic – and I do mean that, as I honestly cannot think of anything interesting to say about it. Except, perhaps, that it fits the launch cast of playable heroes, a squad of competently voiced but barely characterised fantasy bores.
Their abilities, while potent in the right scenarios, also represent Highguard’s proclivity for missing opportunities. Most of them are just straightforward defensive skills you’ve seen in a dozen other hero shooters, or are boringly based on dealing non-gun damage; the dangerous flipside of which, and has always been in games like this, is the risk of undermining players’ core shooting skills. Few of these talents enable more interesting tactical or movement flourishes, as those of Apex Legends – which was co-created and developed by many of the staff now forming Highguard makers Wildlight Entertainment – have been doing for nearly a decade. The mounts, similarly, are ultimately just super-sprint buttons with hooves.
Even that central loot-fight-push loop, while often a successful formula for drama, exhibits some odd balancing decisions. Mainly, it feels far, far too punishing to break a base but then fail to explode anything before a timer counts down; if this happens, your own base loses nearly a third of its health, without opponents laying a trigger-sore finger on it. Since reaching this point requires multiple successive wins (canny gearing, claiming the Shieldbreaker sword, and ferrying it to the other team’s spawn point), that’s an obscene reward for just a few minutes of last-ditch turtling. Against a team with limited respawns, on terrain that naturally advantages the defenders. Haramball with guns, honestly.
Granted, none of this blocks out the possibility of good times in Highguard. Mostly it remains, like I said, decent. The more worrying problem is that in its current state, ‘decent’ looks more like the game’s ceiling than its floor.
The weight of expectation is, being realistic, a factor as well. Highguard may not have advertised beyond its freebie TGA trailer spot but for us knuckldraggers who still appreciate a spot of manshoots, it was enough to know that Wildlight are stacked to their Californian rafters with veterans of Call of Duty 4, Titanfall, and Apex Legends. Three of the best first personers this century, and three of the most impactful too. COD4 changed action games overnight, and even if the two Titanfalls never achieved the same blockbuster status, they modernised the movement shooter with a smoothness and tangibility that none other has surpassed since. Apex, too, is still having its innovations borrowed by rival battle royales and arena shooters alike.
Despite my years of petitioning the British government, Not Making Titanfall 3 is yet to become a criminal offence. But these are, demonstrably, some of the most talented FPS crafters in the business. And while Highguard makes a reasonable first impression, it does sting a little to know that it isn’t another instant belter.
