Highguard has had a rough time since its announcement at The Game Awards at the end of last year. The free-to-play raid shooter, which had the privilege of serving as the final announcement of the night, fell victim to everything that came with that. It was quick to see criticism from the gaming community at large, with its announcement trailer being heavily downvoted, despite much of the game still remaining unseen.
The game’s woes continued with most of the developers at Wildlight being laid off only two weeks after the game’s release in January, calling into question the year-one roadmap laid out at release. Steamdb places the games all time peak for players at 377,266 when the title launched, a number that has greatly diminished, with 3,123 on February 12, being the highest recent point as it continues to shrink.
According to a new report from Game File, Chinese publisher Tencent provided the primary funding for Wildlight Entertainment in the development of Highguard. It’s not like Tencent has funded or invested in Western development; the company currently has a minority stake in Ubisoft. Here, though, neither company has shared this arrangement publicly if true.
Before this report, it was unclear where exactly funding for Wildlight was coming from. According to the studio’s official LinkedIn page, Wildlight is a “new, fully-funded entertainment studio.” What we did know was that the development of Highguard had been ongoing over multiple years prior to the announcement.
The announcement at The Game Awards has also been a point of contention. Some have suggested another title was meant to end the show but pulled out due to a delay, though there has been nothing to confirm this rumor. Initially, given the studio’s relative quiet following the announcement, for a game set to release only a month later, questions arose about the cost of a trailer spot, which can be upwards of a million dollars. Later reports have suggested Geoff Keighley offered Wildlight the spot, with the latter not needing to pay to be featured.
At this time, it is unclear just how intertwined Tencent and Wildlight are, if these reports are to be believed. This would include if Tencent decided to pull funding from the title post-release, leading to mass lay-offs. Wildlights future is shrouded in some uncertainty as well. The studio has issued a statement, saying it would be retaining a “core group of developers” to continue work on Highguard for at least the foreseeable future.
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