Highguard Game Director Chad Grenier says the team released the game in the state they did because the studio, Wildlight Entertainment, was running out of “time and money.”
Highguard is now set to shut down permanently on March 12, as the dwindling player numbers are simply not enough to maintain servers and development costs.
Grenier shared an explanation about the game’s release, after fans questioned why it launched with a limited feature set and why systems like account levels and a skill tree were only being introduced now.
One player said it was “baffling” that Highguard launched in what they described as a “skeleton state,” pointing out that progression features were only being added afterwards.
Grenier responded that the studio had little choice when it came to the timing of the launch.
“When you’re out of time and money, you have to release a game with the runway you have available and hope players will stick with you post-launch.”
Another user asked why the developers were not continuing with the planned Year 1 roadmap to see if the game could recover, referencing the turnaround of No Man’s Sky after its difficult launch.
“Why are you guys not riding out the year 1 road map to see if it bounces back? No mans sky recovered and is now an amazing game that is always populated, and that game had a much larger uphill battle than Highguard does. Live service is meant to improve over time,” the player wrote.
Grenier simply explained that continuing development was not financially possible, given the low player count and resulting revenue.
“Not enough revenue to keep anyone employed to work on it, unfortunately.”
It was reported that Tencent was a secret financial backer of Highguard and Wildlight, but that has not been officially confirmed by either party. After the player count plummeted after launch, Tencent reportedly pulled its funding.
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