- Highguard shuts down after only 45 days
- The studio behind the game says it “has not been able to build a sustainable player base”
- It comes among other high-profile live service flops
Developer Wildlight Entertainment has confirmed that their online shooter Highguard will shut down later this month.
In a notice sent to X, the studio said the game will shut down permanently on March 12, 2026. That’s just 45 days after the game was first released on January 26, 2026.
“Since launch, more than two million players have entered High guard’s world. You shared feedback, created content, and many believed in what we built,” the post read.
“Despite our team’s passion and hard work, we have not been able to build a sustainable player base to support the game long-term.”
The game will no longer be playable after that date, although the team bizarrely confirmed that there will be “one final game update” before then, which will add a new playable Warden, a new weapon, skill trees and more.
Developed over four years by a team that had veteran first-person shooter (FPS) developers who had worked on e.g. Apex Legends and Call of Dutythe Highguard shutdown comes amid a string of other high-profile live-service flops. Sony’s Concord is a particularly notable example, a similar shooter that launched back in August 2024 and was taken offline after just two weeks on the market.
Despite a strong initial player count, Highguard only had a few hundred PC players per day in recent weeks, according to data from SteamDB.
Reactions to the news have been mixed, with some players mocking the announcement while others expressing sympathy for the developers (many of whom were recently fired).
“What a waste of so much time, talent and money,” said one X user. “Really feel so bad for the developers who work so hard on big AAA games and just get shafted.”
“We’re witnessing the era of two-month-life shooters,” joked another.
The best gaming consoles
Follow TechRadar on Google News and add us as a preferred source to get our expert news, reviews and opinions in your feeds. Be sure to click the Follow button!
And of course you can too follow TechRadar on TikTok for news, reviews, video unboxings, and get regular updates from us on WhatsApp also.
