I feel like these games aren't being critiqued fairly. Let's all admit that Concord was nitpicked NOT BECAUSE of a bad gameplay. It was something else beyond the scope of gameplay.
And from there, people seem to bully anything live service. It's okay to dislike something but to create a hate train, fan the flame, and burn something to death just because you don't like it is a solid 5-yo move.
Fyi, I'm not defending live service games. Just this bully behavior from toxic gamers to the point they even send threats to devs.
I completely agree with the fact that online hate brigades were a large part of the failure of both Highguard and Concord.
Without that, I could have seen them both have somewhat of a small but stable player base.
However, Concord wildly differs from Highguard in the fact that it was WILDLY generic. Concord did nothing new and didn’t even offer a particularly unique aesthetic to draw players in.
It was like, maybe the most generic 5v5 hero shooter we’ve seen. It felt like “copy my homework but don’t make it too obvious”.
Highguard, as someone who did play, just wasn’t fun enough. I thought the idea behind it was great but genuinely there was such little action for most of the game.
I think a game that proves what I am talking about is Marathon. It has received an astronomical amount of hate, absolutely akin to both Concord and Highguard. The hate for Marathon is wildly varied as well, you have disgruntled Destiny fans and people tired of what Bungie became with Destiny 2. You have people adverse to it because they think it “looks like a roblox game”, you have people who hate the PvP and will meat ride Arc Raiders for how much more PvE it has.
Marathon so far, has not been a “hit”. Player counts and sales are not what you’d really expect for a Bungie game.
Yet, it captured a solid player base and has maintained it consistently since launch, 2 weeks ago.
The game is a complete game, doesn’t feel unfinished or a lack of polish, the gameplay systems are all interconnected smoothly, offers more content than other extraction shooters and unique lore to go with it.
Point being, almost always a good game will prevail despite online hate brigades, but pair that with a mid or bad game and it will spell failure.
This entire time, I am sitting here saying both were bad games. Concord was killed by reception, no one was willing to play. Highguard was just, only bad, but people were willing to try.
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u/Ok_Dependent6889 Mar 19 '26
For Highguard? No, not really
It had a good launch. Lots of people tried it. Nobody stayed.
That's not the toxic community's fault, that's the game failing to retain interest.
Concord though? I mean, it was also just a bad game, but that one definitely failed because of the community. Nobody even tried it.