Highguard Review – Warden of None

Who is Highguard for?

No, genuinely. Without getting snarky, without proclaiming how live-service games are a plague on this industry, and we don’t need another. And that’s without even acknowledging the obvious: the team behind Titanfall 1 and 2 and Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order led about 100 equally accomplished developers to ship this after four years.

Who is Highguard for?

Is it for hero shooter fans who aren’t interested in memorable characters, interesting abilities, or unique properties? Is it for tactical shooter players who enjoy bomb planting, wall reinforcement, and limited respawns? Is it for the battle royale aficionados who like visiting unique points of interest to collate a collection of interesting loot across? Actually, for all that. Is it even for arena shooter fans, even though it’s only 3v3 as opposed to 5v5 or 6v6?

Well, whoever that may be, they’re not playing Highguard.

That’s not a funny, ha-ha bit for this review. On several occasions, I’ve struggled to start a match because there aren’t enough players. It would behoove Highguard to matchmake further and find someone else, but nope. Back to the lobby with you.

"As part of a team of three, the objective is to venture out of your base and find the Shieldbreaker. Or rather, wait for the Shieldbreaker to form, which unveils the true gameplay loop of Highguard – mining."

I’ve seen the Concord comparisons, and they’ve made me bristle a fair share. “No, no, this isn’t a 5v5 hero shooter with a competitive-style that doesn’t make sense. It’s a 3v3 hero shooter with no competitive playlist, which makes you lose multiple times in a match before calling it quits.” But it vexes me greatly because if you took this gunplay and this art team and applied it to a single-player title with optional co-op, we could have had something enjoyable.

Four years later, and instead, we get Highguard. A PvP “raid” shooter where the team sizes barely qualify as dungeon-worthy in any self-respecting MMO, and that’s maintained roughly 20 percent of its players on Steam about a day after launch.

Since I’ve so eloquently outlined who isn’t playing Highguard, it’s probably a good idea to explain what it even is. You’re a Warden, who’s basically a magic-wielder with guns. Far be it from me to expect Wildlight to go with a vibe befitting The Gunslinger, but that’s who you are. There are eight to choose from, and I can only remember two names – Mara and Scarlet. Scarlet is the knife lady who can also cloak and escape danger. You’ve played Jett from Valorant. It’s the same, right down to resetting cooldowns on kills.

Mara can grant additional shields to the team and set up a respawn point, the latter offering some clutch revives when trying to destroy the Anchor Stone. Otherwise, there’s a guy with a cape who does…something, a beast-like guy who can tear through walls like they’re cheddar, and a fire bro who’s really into vests.

As part of a team of three, the objective is to venture out of your base and find the Shieldbreaker. Or rather, wait for the Shieldbreaker to form, which unveils the true gameplay loop of Highguard – mining. It gives you Vesper, the currency used to purchase better weapons, accessories, armor charges and more from Flynn, the vendor. It also inexplicably has a timing mechanic, and while it seems annoying at first, executing it perfectly activates this super-swing that can immediately destroy the next ore node.

"The best part? If the enemy consistently defends their base and then brings the Shieldbreaker over to yours, it’s GG."

Gunfights, unfortunately, can be very sporadic – probably one or two before it’s raiding time. Pitting only two teams of three against each other is absurd enough – not like it couldn’t work on something like Bloodgulch, but Highguard’s maps are huge. You can easily go in one direction and never see the enemy team until it’s time to claim the Shieldbreaker. And for such large tracts, the fact that I only ever really saw one notable random event – a loot drop with a power weapon that didn’t even feel all that powerful – I’m left to wonder why I should bother.

It’s probably for those who aren’t as confident in facing other players to avoid danger and mine resources. Why not add PvE enemies or mid-bosses that actually award Amulets, higher-tier shields, or unique weapons? Why are these maps just so empty and dead? Throw in two extra teams at a minimum. Increase the team sizes to 10v10 and throw multiple Shieldbreakers on the map. Something, anything aside from this tedium.

But I digress. When it is time to fight the enemy team, I’m baffled by the utter lack of synergy in their abilities. Scarlet, at least, has some playmaking potential if you can land enough knife hits and Mara allows for additional revives and damage absorption during a raid. Otherwise, time to kill can be fairly quick on pretty much every round of a match, because just as you gain more shields, Legendaries start dropping like candy. That means faster time-to-kill, which translates to quicker deaths and more riding out into the world to reconnect with your team.

“Every round?” you ask. Why, yes. After acquiring the Shieldbreaker and marching it to the enemy base to initiate a raid, a skirmish of attrition begins. Either you sabotage their generators to reduce the overall base health or the Anchor Stone to immediately end a match. Defenders are on bomb defusal duty, whereas attackers must camp a sabotaged generator to destroy it. Fail against the defense and your own base is damaged. The next round then commences. Now do it all over again.

The best part? If the enemy consistently defends their base and then brings the Shieldbreaker over to yours, it’s GG. Even better is that during the phase where both times fight over possession of the sword, respawns can become locked until one side emerges victorious. You can thus watch in vain as your one sole defender tries in vain to stop the enemy from tickling your base to blow it up. Truly an incredible finish to multiple rounds of boring looting and so-so mining.

"Why reinforce something when it’s so easily destroyed? Why bother spending money on rocket launcher ammo when I could just shoot a structure with a secondary weapon and break it just as easily?"

“Well, you can do the same thing,” someone will doubtless say, and I agree. It’s still a boring way to end a match, and even in terms of balance, it becomes very easy to snowball the opposing team.

But aside from the bizarre design decisions, the largely forgettable heroes, and the mostly boring gameplay loop that can result in matches lasting an agonizing 40 minutes? That’s all there is to Highguard. Say what you will about Concord, but at least it launched with multiple modes (most of which I didn’t care for, but hey). I barely mentioned the raid tools, real-time destruction and reinforcement because they feel so tacked on. Why reinforce something when it’s so easily destroyed? Why bother spending money on rocket launcher ammo when I could just shoot a structure with a secondary weapon and break it just as easily?

What annoys me all the more is that there are some fundamental aspects of the gunplay and movement which are pretty decent. As uninspired as the weapons can be (never mind the lackluster variety), they can feel good to control when mouse acceleration isn’t driving me up the wall. I was mildly impressed at how much better guns can feel to control as they increase in rarity.

Similarly, the mounts don’t feel too shabby, seamlessly teleporting in and out, especially if you happen to catch a zipline. Heck, even the sliding feels smooth. Which isn’t to say there aren’t issues – activating Mara’s cloak while on horseback resulted in getting on a rock and a quick death.

And regardless of the generic aesthetic, these environments are gorgeous. Each base feels unique in terms of layout and overall division of objectives while offering different themes. I’ll also admit – watching the siege engine teleport in and slowly but purposefully breaking down the enemy’s base is pretty cool. Too bad it feels less impressive after multiple times in a match.

"After all this, we come full circle and I ask once again. Who is Highguard for? What does it really offer that’s unique in today’s market, outside of combining several discordant competitive shooter mechanics into an abomination that’s more boring than hideous?"

Unfortunately, this all comes at a cost. I’ve read reports about forced Temporal Anti-Aliasing and how low post-processing can force upscaling separate from DLSS and the internal resolution. Regardless, Highguard’s environmental textures and details did not look good even at 1440p with everything set to Medium (and my hardware is well beyond the recommended requirements). I thus opted to see everything to High, knocking the resolution down to 1080p and frame rate to 60 FPS, resulting in a mostly stable experience. But I couldn’t shake this feeling of blurriness coating everything. My cabinet’s fans also sounded like they were prepping for take-off, even with minimal action happening.

Highguard offers an extensive amount of microtransactions, but there’s also a free Warbond-like battle pass that you can unlock items from using in-game currency (which is separate from the unlockable cosmetics for weapons and Wardens). It’s par for the course in today’s multiplayer sphere, except I received a measly 80 purpley doodahs after 40 minutes of play, and one item unlock costs 400. You’ll be shocked to hear that I won’t be spending another two hours and 40 minutes to amass more, even if there are other sources.

After all this, we come full circle and I ask once again. Who is Highguard for? What does it really offer that’s unique in today’s market, outside of combining several discordant competitive shooter mechanics into an abomination that’s more boring than hideous?

This game was reviewed on PC.