After roughly five hours spent playing Highguard, I have come to a conclusion: This game is neither terrible nor incredible, but the mounts are absolutely amazing.
It’s no secret that Wildlight Entertainment’s 10-year journey to reinvent the FPS genre has resulted in some pretty mixed feedback from players and critics, not to mention a seriously rocky launch. I personally find the game to be quite fun, if a bit slow-paced for my tastes. But honestly? The mounts are what keep me coming back.
I’ve never been much of a horse girl. Real horses freak me out, while horses in games often frustrate me by getting themselves killed (looking at you, Oblivion) or creep me out by being half-human. Still, I’m having a hell of a lot of fun with Highguard’s beasty buddies. I wasn’t surprised to discover that Wildlight’s free-to-play “raid shooter” has slick movement mechanics — these are the people behind Titanfall and Apex Legends, after all. But I wasn’t really expecting those satisfying movement mechanics to apply to the game’s rideable horses, bears, panthers, and eldergryphs, too.
The most fun I’ve had in my time with Highguard has been on horseback, chasing enemies down while firing away like some sort of sci-fi-fantasy version of Arthur Morgan. Mounts offer a considerable speed boost, and although they can be temporarily killed by enemy players, they respawn in a few seconds. Unlike pretty much every other game featuring horse-riding, Highguard doesn’t force players to call the animal to them, nor does it waste time with a lengthy climbing-up-into-the-saddle animation.
Instead, companion beasts simply materialize under the player at the press of a button, and disappear just as quickly with another button press when players no longer need them. These creatures run and jump with speed and grace, and I’ve yet to experience one getting stuck on terrain. It seems that Wildlight has put a great deal of effort into making sure Highguard‘s maps are horse-friendly.
The only problem here is that, as I said, I find Highguard‘s gameplay a bit bland overall. I’d much rather be riding a panther while firing a machine gun in a single-player campaign, or at least in a faster-paced game mode.
The good news is that a mount-based mode might actually be a possibility. Nothing is officially in the works yet, but game director Chad Grenier recently told Polygon that Wildlight is toying with the idea of a mount-racing mode, which I would absolutely love to see come to the game.
“Something that we haven’t started yet that’s been floating around at the studio is horse racing and things like that,” Grenier said. “I mean, the possibilities are endless.”
A free mount-racing mode would help make up for those $18 horse armor skins, at least.
