Servers for Highguard, which launched only this past January, are scheduled to go dark on March 14.
Wildlight Entertainment has officially confirmed that Highguard will be permanently shuttered, with service termination set for March 14. This move adds the title to the growing list of short-lived live-service casualties, drawing parallels to Sony’s Concord, which was pulled from shelves and refunded just two weeks after its debut.
Despite a string of high-profile failures in the live-service sector, publishers and venture capitalists remain undeterred in their quest to fund the next big hit. Developer Tyler Glaiel suggests that this persistence is rooted in the unique economic incentives and aggressive expectations of modern investors.
Glaiel, the creative mind behind Mewgenics and The End Is Nigh, characterizes these live-service titles as speculative financial gambles. He points out that while the probability of a “breakout success” may hover around a mere 5%, the astronomical potential for recurring revenue makes the risk palatable for major stakeholders.
According to his assessment, the capital required to develop such projects is relatively marginal for massive corporations when weighed against the chance of securing a multi-billion dollar hit. This explains why the industry continues to greenlight expensive, high-risk endeavors even with the looming statistical certainty of a market saturation collapse.
Source: iXBT.games