Now that Highguard is finally out, we can get a quick look at how its launch went. And it’s a real mixed bag.

First things first, it reached a respectable 97,249 concurrent Steam players roughly one hour into its launch. That would have comfortably placed it at the top 10 most played games on Steam.
As of this writing, it’s now in the 10,000+ concurrent player count. We’re writing this 13 hours after launch, so it’s definitely off-peak hours for US players. It’s too early to make any conclusions based on this.
Steam reviews are clearly unfavorable. 14,062 out of a total 18,152 reviews are mostly negative. However, observers suspect that Highguard may have been review bombed because many players didn’t even spend an hour to play it.
The official Highguard Twitter account has acknowledged complaints about performance issues, promising a client update later tonight and more patches for the week.
Memes aside, it’s too early to make a judgement call. It’s clear that Highguard isn’t for everyone, but there might still be enough players to make it successful.
