Highguard will permanently shut down its servers on Wednesday, March 12. The PvP shooter failed to create a community despite quickly reaching two million players across all platforms.
A former developer named Josh Sobel has spoken out again on X. When the game’s demise was announced, this technical artist who worked at Wildlight Entertainment lashed out at players. Laid off in February, he stated that “the situation had only gotten worse since the trailer was released,” pointing to harsh criticism from internet users even before Highguard was released.
This week, Sobel went back on his comments. He believes he expressed himself poorly in the heat of the moment and that nothing could have guaranteed the game’s success.
“Since I reactivated my account, I’ll address the elephant in the room. My now-deleted tweet following the Highguard layoff news a month ago was a mistake. I was stressed, devastated, angry, and running on 2hrs sleep. It was not wise to take my pain to the Internet in that volatile state.
I stand by the intent behind much of what I said, but I phrased it poorly, and some of my anger was misdirected. I believe the online discourse around Highguard had some very dark corners that may have accelerated the timeline of our failure beyond the natural outcome of reasonable critique, but it wasn’t the primary cause, and I don’t personally believe the ultimate outcome would have been thoroughly different without it. There were a lot of elements involved, and there’s no way to know how it would have gone under different circumstances.
I restored my Twitter account a few days before the 1-month no-recover date, because I value the connections I’ve made on here. I’ll be keeping replies locked to accounts I follow for the time being because I maintain the right to protect my mental health. It’s time for my next chapter. Thanks for listening.”
