Highguard's trailer landed with a thud at 2025's biggest award show, but it didn't pay for the privilege.
Remember when Apex Legends was shadow dropped? It’s a risky move for such a high-profile game to skip all the pre-release marketing hype entirely, but it paid off, and it’s clear why Respawn went that route—“photoreal PvP hero shooter” was an eyeroll-inducing prospect even back in 2019, so letting the game speak for itself short-circuited any pre-release angst.
We don’t know if the strategy could have been replicated, but would it have been worse than the late Concord’s legendary failure or the reaction to the recently announced Highguard, which was the final big reveal at last year’s Game Awards? Viewers expecting something like 2023’s Monster Hunter Wilds reveal or the one-two Matrix Unreal Engine 5 tech demo and Matrix 4 trailer in 2021 have been taking out their frustrations on Highguard.
The reveal was drowned out by hot takes calling out its “Concord vibes” and it received a ghastly 2,400 dislikes on YouTube compared to around 500 likes when it first dropped. There’s been an assumption to some of the criticism that Highguard wanted this smoke, so to speak—an idea that if the Highguard studio hadn’t splurged on such an exclusive spot, it wouldn’t have earned all this ire.
I am totally done with live service games. 1200+ hours in Warframe and another 300 in helldivers. I have no interest in grinding out the same mission repeatedly to get that new armor again. It was fun the first time less so the second and I would rather play something new.
I personally don’t judge a game on the spot it got in a show. As someone who likes hero shooters, I give it a chance (if it runs on Linux). My first reaction was, that the game doesn’t look interesting. But re watching the trailer, there is some stuff going on. And coming from the Titanfall / Apex Legends team, this can be a good game in the end. I honestly want to have more hero shooters to choose from…
Yes, it was disappointing as the last special “there is one more thing”. But honestly, can you judge the entire game by that? Or should you judge the show instead? Off course if you don’t like hero shooters, that’s a different story.
Monster Hunter Wilds and Matrix 4, huh? It looks to me like the Game Awards don‘t have the best track record for choosing their last big reveal if that‘s what people expect.
I’ll give you the private fiefdom part, but whatever other criticisms you’ve got for the Game Awards, and there are so many, that man loves video games. Putting Highguard there was likely misreading the room, but he probably thought it would be a banger.
Honestly what I think happened is, in the lead up to the game awards there was a lot of talk about the cost of slots & I imagine the final of the show cost a pretty penny. Then I think no one was willing to buy said slot so the haphazardly shoved something in a lot closer to the event then the usually would. I doubt this was anyone’s first choice.
I’m ambivalent on it, but definitely not negative. I hate that everyone watching big game shows is hoping to see “Ratchet & Kratos 7” or “Dark Lore 5” or “Metal Gear Sonic 11”. Especially since, as you know, every decent mid level game developer these days has been fired at least once by morons with MBAs, and so the industry must make new IPs from the scattered devs.
Its art doesn’t speak for itself, I think on multiplayer it usually doesn’t. We’ll have to see how it feels later.
I love hero shooters. Its my favorite type of multiplayer online game. I wish we had more variety than just a handful. Other genres get lot of variety and people pick the best and favorite one.
It’s not really a hero shooter, but I think it stands out. The Finals.
You have 3 distinct class options. Light, Medium and Heavy, with base build options for each one.
So as a light you are small fast and then can have one of 3 abilities, dashes, a grappling hook, or invisibility. A medium, more health but larger and slower, can have a healing gun, turret or dematerializer(temporarily remove walls). Or finally a heavy, very big and slow, but even more health, and can choose between a hook, shield, charge(smashes through walls), or a good gun.
You the pick a gun, and 4 utility options. The guns are class locked, so you can have a mp5 on a light, but a heavy gets a M60, all distinct and a pretty well matched for the classes. You utility options are more mixed, you have general options like frag, pyro, gas and goo grenades, but also specific ones like a jump pad for medium, or teleport gates for light, heavy gets barricades.
So while it isn’t a hero shooter it’s got a nice blend of hero shooter elements, and I personally love that it couples that with destructible environments. The main game mode(cashout and tournament), is a 3v3v3v3 capture and hold with 2 active points that can also be doubled up, but the point you hold is movable. You can bury it under rubble, move it into the open, or just fortify the area as best you can.
I would recommend it to anyone who is looking for more heros shooters, if you don’t mind relaxing the hero part of it .
I play Rivals a lot. Played Paladins for couple of hundred hours too and that wasn’t it (besides stopped working on Linux). The biggest problem of Rivals in my opinion is, its too much for casual and unbalanced, and their focus is to make it “engaging and fun”. Nothing will beat peak Overwatch 1 days, that’s for sure…
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There is definite live service game fatigue going on.
I am totally done with live service games. 1200+ hours in Warframe and another 300 in helldivers. I have no interest in grinding out the same mission repeatedly to get that new armor again. It was fun the first time less so the second and I would rather play something new.
It will be good, or bad… But now every influencer will try it on launch.
I personally don’t judge a game on the spot it got in a show. As someone who likes hero shooters, I give it a chance (if it runs on Linux). My first reaction was, that the game doesn’t look interesting. But re watching the trailer, there is some stuff going on. And coming from the Titanfall / Apex Legends team, this can be a good game in the end. I honestly want to have more hero shooters to choose from…
Yes, it was disappointing as the last special “there is one more thing”. But honestly, can you judge the entire game by that? Or should you judge the show instead? Off course if you don’t like hero shooters, that’s a different story.
Judging how they blocked Linux players on Apex Legends, I doubt it will run on Linux…
But its not from EA, isn’t it?
Monster Hunter Wilds and Matrix 4, huh? It looks to me like the Game Awards don‘t have the best track record for choosing their last big reveal if that‘s what people expect.
As per my understanding from the last VGA comments, it is the private fiefdom of a techbro idiot who neither knows nor cares what people expect.
Are you calling Geoff Keighley a tech bro?
In spirit.
I’ll give you the private fiefdom part, but whatever other criticisms you’ve got for the Game Awards, and there are so many, that man loves video games. Putting Highguard there was likely misreading the room, but he probably thought it would be a banger.
Honestly what I think happened is, in the lead up to the game awards there was a lot of talk about the cost of slots & I imagine the final of the show cost a pretty penny. Then I think no one was willing to buy said slot so the haphazardly shoved something in a lot closer to the event then the usually would. I doubt this was anyone’s first choice.
I’m ambivalent on it, but definitely not negative. I hate that everyone watching big game shows is hoping to see “Ratchet & Kratos 7” or “Dark Lore 5” or “Metal Gear Sonic 11”. Especially since, as you know, every decent mid level game developer these days has been fired at least once by morons with MBAs, and so the industry must make new IPs from the scattered devs.
Its art doesn’t speak for itself, I think on multiplayer it usually doesn’t. We’ll have to see how it feels later.
People are still playing hero-shooters?
I love hero shooters. Its my favorite type of multiplayer online game. I wish we had more variety than just a handful. Other genres get lot of variety and people pick the best and favorite one.
I’d love another good hero shooter after Overwatch shit the bed, and Rivals doesn’t really do it for me.
It’s been my favorite multiplayer genre since Quake World Team Fortress.
It’s not really a hero shooter, but I think it stands out. The Finals.
You have 3 distinct class options. Light, Medium and Heavy, with base build options for each one.
So as a light you are small fast and then can have one of 3 abilities, dashes, a grappling hook, or invisibility. A medium, more health but larger and slower, can have a healing gun, turret or dematerializer(temporarily remove walls). Or finally a heavy, very big and slow, but even more health, and can choose between a hook, shield, charge(smashes through walls), or a good gun.
You the pick a gun, and 4 utility options. The guns are class locked, so you can have a mp5 on a light, but a heavy gets a M60, all distinct and a pretty well matched for the classes. You utility options are more mixed, you have general options like frag, pyro, gas and goo grenades, but also specific ones like a jump pad for medium, or teleport gates for light, heavy gets barricades.
So while it isn’t a hero shooter it’s got a nice blend of hero shooter elements, and I personally love that it couples that with destructible environments. The main game mode(cashout and tournament), is a 3v3v3v3 capture and hold with 2 active points that can also be doubled up, but the point you hold is movable. You can bury it under rubble, move it into the open, or just fortify the area as best you can.
I would recommend it to anyone who is looking for more heros shooters, if you don’t mind relaxing the hero part of it .
That does sound interesting, kind of like you build your own class. I’ll check it out, thanks!
I play Rivals a lot. Played Paladins for couple of hundred hours too and that wasn’t it (besides stopped working on Linux). The biggest problem of Rivals in my opinion is, its too much for casual and unbalanced, and their focus is to make it “engaging and fun”. Nothing will beat peak Overwatch 1 days, that’s for sure…