Josh Sobel, a former technical artist at Wildlight Entertainment, has reactivated his X account after deactivating it last month amid backlash from a post about Highguard's failure. He stands by the intent of his original comments but regrets the poor phrasing, attributing it to stress following the game's shutdown announcement. Highguard, a 3v3 live-service hero shooter, is set to go offline on March 12, 2026—45 days after its January 26 launch.
Highguard, developed by Wildlight Entertainment, launched on January 26, 2026, as a 3v3 live-service hero shooter. It peaked at around 100,000 concurrent players and drew 1.5 million users initially but failed to retain players and will shut down on March 12, 2026.
In February, following layoffs after launch, technical artist Josh Sobel posted on X about the abuse his team faced after the game's Game Awards reveal and suggested online negativity contributed to its troubles. The post sparked backlash, leading him to delete it and deactivate his account.
On March 10, Sobel reactivated his account, calling the original post a 'mistake.' He explained the poor phrasing stemmed from being 'stressed, devastated, angry, and running on 2hrs sleep' post-shutdown news. Sobel stands by the intent, noting 'very dark corners' of online discourse may have 'accelerated the timeline of our failure,' though not the primary cause. He admitted some anger was 'misdirected.'
Sobel reactivated to maintain valuable X connections and has limited replies to followers only. Highguard's short life is blamed on design choices, market saturation, and other factors; a recent content update was released for remaining players.
