So I jumped in for the last few days and I'm quoting my old post on this because some-one on the team was listening to feedback it seems and I'll say this, if Highguard had launched in the state it was at the end it would have stood far more of a chance. I wouldn't have said it would set the world on fire and be the next Fortnite but I think it would have held on and been a decently populated game.
So to go over the end of days what Highguard was like contrasting with my earlier. post.
5 vs 5 - the good mode
New Character (Wolf dude) - still bugged but there was an attempt at a quick fix done to make him less OP in that his wolf spirit only generally homes in on the nearest enemy now and moves slower so you only generally get to reveal one enemy. His ult still felt a bit OP but far more balanced.
Another New character who felt oddly better balanced added too but required people to use different tactics to beat him as he had a shield he could put up (he couldn't fire while maintaining the shield) but it means he was powerful in 1 vs 1 fights if you broke his shield by only firing at him and having to then reload giving him an opening.
Gear up stage - Added secret chests you could find with perks (we'll get onto that) and made mining crystals faster with the right perks
Walls being too easy to destroy - A new perk you could get that added extra strong reinforcements to them, this really fixed an issue I'd say making things more tactical.
Weapon balance - a lot better though the burst assault rifle was still bad. I got kills with the auto shotgun and saw more people running SMGs too
The community - Still an issue with people being able to be AFK for far too long before it kicked them and then still having to wait minutes for the match to declare it was safe to leave.
New skill points system and perks - Jesus this felt like it fixed so many issues. As you leveled up in the game you unlocked skill points which gave you access to perks which just made the game better. Want to mine crystals? OK perks to make it easier, to make it so you earn more and make it so nearby team-mates also gain currency from your work. Better reinforced walls that meant it now added a 3rd hit to take them down. Want Faster health regen or armour regen? You can have them. Want to unlock the weapons vaults on the map without as much work? There's a perk for that. Perks to get better armour. Perks to stop armour breaking. Perks to turn yourself into a mobile spawn point while being raided. Perks to get more raid tools. Perks to reward you more for fighting. Perks to make you less vulnerable while ressing a team mate. The system was mad and because you had limited points you couldn't become a master of everything. The one minor gripe I have is you couldn't set up a few different perk loadouts for different roles like say playing a warden who specialises more in being able to res people and taking more the defence and res perks.
New Map - Not my favourite very weird design with a short distance between the bases and a long far away looking area
New base type - Basically a Zeppelin base with Zepplin and it was very odd to play but definitely different to the others a strong central area and smaller more exposed out ones with a main area that could overlook the whole area but little easy connectivity between the places.
New Weapon - The I think it was switchback rifle, oddly pretty cool as an alternative to the ranger rifle, worse scope but could rifle multiple shots off in succession dealing more damage per shot that the ranger but less critical damage and less able to get headshots. It could shred armour while the Ranger relied on critical shots and headshots more.
Gameplay - oddly felt mechanically improved, it felt smoother like some stuff had been tweaked and felt very close to Apex Legends level of smoothness
New Tool - The Lockpick gun, holy crap this was a game changer, with reinforced walls being tougher this suddenly became a more viable items with more tactical uses. The idea being you fire it at an enemy door or window and you gain control over it allowing you to open and close it while raiding but stopping the enemy doing so. I won one match because the enemy had fully reinforced their base and I used a warden who could shift walls to allow you to walk through, I walked through the wall waiting for the effect to go and the wall to reform, took control of all the doors and windows on the building and planted the bomb. The enemy couldn't get in and had to start destroying their own wall to get to me meanwhile my team were just filtering in to defend via the doors at the back. Also it could unlock the weapons vaults.
If Highguard had launched in this state, I'd probably have at least come back regularly to it to every so often because
Screw it I'll jump in.
Yes I've played it.
No won't be sticking with it.
5 vs 5 improved things but man the game has issues.
So they've put in a new character, he's bugged and broken to an OP degree so far, his active ability he's meant to send out a wolf spirit thing that finds injured players and marks them for your team. It doesn't work it finds any player and the game considers them injured even at full armour and health I'm guessing due to a bug thinking unless they have endgame armour they're not full health so every enemy gets marked and thus he's a better version of an existing character whose detection ability only works if enemies move and it tells them when the scan happens so they know to stay still.
The gear up stage gets boring if you end up relying on mining the gems to get currency to trade with it feels like we at least need to be shooting enemies carrying the crystals or something.
They either need to make walls harder to break (Reinforced walls just take 2 hits or a thumper charge to destroy normal walls 1 hit or can be destroyed via multiple melee strikes or one of the characters who has as his active ability the ability 2 charges where he can smash walls) or easier to repair. It shouldn't be so quick an enemy can 1 shot the wall you spent 15 seconds repairing.
Weapon balance is still an issue. Some weapons are just useless or inferior to others it's not different usage cases it's just inferior like the burst fire assault rifle either of the others is just outright better. Or the auto shotgun, I've not got 1 kill with the thing but the pump action Kraken I can devastate with.
The community. Oh man I've played Dota 2 and I've been playing Rivals a lot. I've not played a game with a community this in need of some Chlorine in the pool than this one. It's like being back in the old COD Lobby days, only this game requires some teamwork and co-ordination so Johnny 12 year old on about how much of a 1337 sniper he is who couldn't hit a bar with a nuclear explosion and keeps dying then ragequits but to avoid leaver penalty AFKs at the spawn and the game takes 5 or more minutes to remove them isn't great. Nor the people who apparently don't understand basics like actually getting armour in the game or being so stupid I swear this happened, one dude didn't know how to open the chests to get items. It's 1 button press and he followed me round all game waiting for me to open the chests then running over to try and grab stuff. I've had mic spam, people yelling about Noob team (the guy had least kills and revives all game). The matchmaking doesn't seem to fix this either I've had few close games and far more absolute stomps or been absolutely stomped. Oh and with crossplay on I'm pretty sure I've run into hackers too.
Gameplay wise it feels like a rougher Apex Legends. In Apex I wasn't bad but here because there's no restoration items it's trying to be more tactical but it often comes down to whose got the most people nearby in a fight than some skilled battle. It's like congrats you killed the enemy, you have no armour and probably only half health hope you can hide in cover before one of his team mates comes in and kills you anyway. Oh but you can restore health and armour if you banish the enemies soul gem........ which is now in the wide open in perfect sight line for the enemies team mates so even if you do it you'll be getting shot to pieces and lose all the restored armour and health so hiding for it to regen is somehow the best option.
