Marathon Will Be Concord 3.0 Unless It Learns From Highguard

Earlier today, it was announced that Highguard, the 2026 shooter from ex-Titanfall and Apex Legends developers, will be permanently shutting down on 12 March 2026. A whopping 45 days.

Following the last big reveal at The Game Awards in December 2025, Highguard, developed by the indie studio Wildlight Entertainment, was intended to be the next free-to-play hero/raid shooter sensation, but it didn't quite go according to plan.

In a statement, the developers said: "Despite the passion and hard work of our team, we have not been able to build a sustainable player base to support the game long term. Servers will remain online until March 12th. We hope you’ll jump in with us one more time to show your support and get those final great matches in while we still can."

In a statement on Twitter, the developers also thanked the support of the community, its two million players and those who still want to play Highguard can enjoy its upcoming final content update, albeit for only a week or so.

This news followed the announcement of mass layoffs at Wildlight Entertainment just 16 days after the launch of Highguard, which was an early indication that the writing was already on the proverbial wall.

This game was doomed to fail from the start, and there's one game that needs to take a valuable lesson from this - Bungie's Marathon - slated for release on 5 March, if it wants to avoid the same fate.

Highguard should never have been doomed to fail in the first place

There was a real vitriol online as soon as the trailer dropped as the last big reveal at The Game Awards, a slot typically reserved for a major new AAA release or a highly anticipated sequel.

I must say, Highguard being that final reveal was an instant comedown. When Geoff Keighley, presenter and games journalist, teased that it was from some of the folks that worked on the Titanfall series, it would be fair to assume that many hoped that this reveal would be for the long-awaited Titanfall 3. After all, that would be one heck of a final announcement at The Game Awards.

So Highguard was already facing an uphill challenge, a month before it was released. At this point, the internet decided it was already over Highguard. Marathon is a legacy sequel to the 90's Bungie classic, pre-Halo. If it doesn't live up to fan's expectations, it'll risk tarnishing those memories. Live-action games can be very hit and miss when it comes to the community reception, whether it’s free-to-play or not (which Marathon isn't).

You can remind yourself of the middling trailer here.

When Highguard launched, it garnered very impressive player numbers, at least on the PC platform, Steam. According to SteamDB, Highguard achieved 97,249 concurrents, but it was only downhill from there.

Just hours after its launch, the Steam concurrents took a massive nosedive of a whopping 90%, that’s a loss of over 87,500 players! Of course, this doesn't include numbers on console, but I would imagine, pound for pound, it might be a similar ballpark. At the time of writing this article, Highguard has a pitiful 24-hour concurrent peak of 460 players, and as I write, there are just 154 players in the game on Steam.

Players struggled to accept Highguard, Marathon is facing the same fate

The most common complaint that I’ve seen across social media is that Highguard's maps were very barren. Highguard initially launched as a game with teams of three, but players felt that the maps were way too large. This is a very important learning for Marathon - we curently don't know if there are plans for a 4v4, or a 5v5 Arena mode. Early testers say it already feels like this is missing from the game and would make it so much more interesting to play. Risking your loadout to build and craft ideal kit, that you take into a no-risk PvP arena to sharpen your skills as a runner would give a much sharper gameplay loop.

We have plenty of extraction shooters already and Marathon is so late to that party in its current state.

Highguard didn't understand this. For example, when spawning at the start of the game, it would be a bit of a trek to approach the objective area. Then if you died, you’d have to rinse and repeat. This was an issue that I experienced with Battlefield 2042, and it was instantly off-putting.

On top of that, its gameplay loop wasn't enticing enough, with players becoming bored of the action very quickly (hence the 90% nosedive), Moreover, players for the most part, didn't like the generic designs of the hero characters and if a player left or disconnected from your team, everyone would be booted from the game, which is very annoying, to say the least.

Highguard, Wildlight Entetainment

Former Dev Gives an Opinion on What Went Wrong

As reported by IGN, former Wildlight Entertainment developer and level designer Alex Graner said that Highguard leaned too much into being a competitive shooter, which alienated the casual gamer.

“You don't strive to create something that doesn't work out, but it happens, unfortunately. Throughout development, we really leaned into the competitive side of it, and that was always one of my biggest fears as a player,” Graner said.

“It's all designed to be a team-based shooter. I think that was the biggest thing. People just kind of turned it off because they didn't have the team.”

In a nutshell, as long as you have a reliable team to play with, Highguard is fine. However, there was no chance of playing it solo, so if you didn't have a team going in, you had to pin your hopes on randoms.

The developers did come under heavy fire from the community before and after launch, as is the nature of the internet. That being said, people have a right to voice their opinion, whether they like the look of something or not, and most seem to vent reasonable criticism.

Will Marathon Learn From Concord and Highguard?

Marathon, Bungie

The ill-fated PlayStation first-party title Concord from the now-closed Firewalk Studios, another attempt at the live-action hero shooter, was the biggest flop of 2024, with Sony shutting down the game after just 12 days. Concord launched on 23 August 2024 and ended on 6 September 2024.

Unlike Highguard, Concord was not a free-to-play game, something that it shares in common with Bungie’s live-service, extraction shooter, Marathon. Bungie is the creator of the legendary Halo series, as well as Destiny, and is one of the most famous developers of the first-person shooter genre.

From a shooting perspective, I have no doubts that Marathon will feel great to play, in that respect. The Halo and Destiny games developed by Bungie have always felt very satisfying.

However, Marathon already began with a sour start after it plagiarised artwork in the game, and even though its graphics appear to have been improved with each new gameplay reveal, not everyone is a fan of its visual design.

While Marathon will already have a core audience looking forward to playing the full game when it launches tomorrow on 5 March 2026, that won’t be enough to sustain long-term success. It has to pull something big out of the bag to not only win over those who are already hating on the game but also those sitting on the fence.

It perhaps doesn't work in Marathon’s favour that it’s not a free-to-play game and will require a one-off purchase to play. Marathon needs satisfying first-person action, a fun gameplay loop, a reliable matchmaking system and enough quality content updates that continually entice players to return.

Will Marathon be a success, or will it be the next live-action casualty? Despite my doubts, I’m hoping it will be a success. Only time will tell.