Highguard Just Makes Me Want to Play This 19-Year-Old Shooter

Highguard, for all its flaws, has proven a fun distraction since it launched. There are a lot of great qualities to its frenetic gunplay, genuinely compelling roster of available heroes, and bizarre mix of fantasy and firearms that takes a little getting used to before you truly settle in. Oh, and riding a bear is always a lot of fun. While there’s certainly room for improvement, Highguard is delivering enough to fill the void that has plagued the hero shooter genre for some time.

However, despite my general enthusiasm for this burgeoning new shooter, I can’t help but reflect on one of the oldest in the genre. For all Highguard’s strengths, Team Fortress 2, a game that released 19 years ago (I am old), still has a hold over me that I struggle to explain. There are, naturally, a lot of similarities between the two experiences, but there is one crucial difference that makes Team Fortress 2 remain the classic of the genre that it is today.

Team Fortress 2 Is Still The Best Hero Shooter Available

Team Fortress 2 is easily Valve’s best game, one with such an enduring legacy that it still regularly hits over 40,000 concurrent players, according to SteamDB, despite having released back in 2007. Of course, I am a tad biased, on account of having played the precursor to much of the great hero shooter and live service offerings we enjoy today during a very formative time of my life. Going around my friend’s house and playing TF2 while downing tube after tube of Pringles and chocolate chip cookies are some of my fondest memories, even if they are somewhat tainted by my inadequacies as a true gamer at the time.

However, despite that bias, it is hard to deny both the incredible influence TF2 has had on the hero shooter genre in particular, but also on games as a whole. That is, largely, owing to its deceptive simplicity. It is ridiculously easy to get into, its maps are so expertly crafted as to never confuse the player, and its game modes are fun twists on traditional concepts, enabling even the newest of players to quickly grasp what to do. There are also enough roles that players will easily settle into their favorite, without feeling as if there’s too huge a gap in skill between themselves and those around them.

Indeed, Team Fortress 2’s classes are what make it so unique, each perfectly balanced and in tune with one another. It was the first time in my life that I felt compelled to be the healer and the only time I’ve ever enjoyed stealthing around. The fact that each class has its own weapon to master as well as a suite of simple-to-grasp-yet-hard-to-master abilities means that you were constantly challenged, even as you enter your umpteenth round of Dustbowl. Valve made history with TF2, so much so that its influence can still be felt on hero shooters like Highguard releasing 19 years later.

TF2 Deserves Another Shot in 2026

Despite its consistently high player count, it does feel as if barely anyone talks about Team Fortress 2 anymore. With the likes of Overwatch, Marvel Rivals, and even Highguard releasing and dominating the general discussion, the ever-reliable TF2 gets somewhat relegated to being a legendary classic. That’s a shame, as TF2 is, in my opinion, better than Marvel Rivals, or, at the very least, just as good and an incredibly intuitive experience for those who’ve never tried it before.

Better still, Team Fortress 2 is completely free and has been since 2011. Its varied classes are easy to pick up, its community is largely friendly and welcoming, and its experience is fine-tuned thanks to a plethora of updates across the years. The game’s timeless art style, fluid controls, and beautifully designed gunplay also prevent it from feeling like a game nearly two decades old. TF2 is just as fun today as it was 19 years ago, and that is unlikely to change any time soon unless Valve inexplicably decides to pull the servers. With plenty of Valve-produced content and community-made maps to enjoy, there’s no shortage of fun to be had.

Indeed, in my own experience, returning to TF2 after having been away from it for so many years genuinely felt like coming home. It was a strange, nostalgia-filled trip, one that proved that Team Fortress 2 is just as fun to me now as it was all those years ago, holed up in my friend’s manga-filled room, eating Pringles, devouring chocolate chip cookies, downing Ting, and playing round after round of Capture the Flag. Of course, if you’re reticent to try such an old game (not that it in any way feels like one), then you’re in luck as Valve is developing a spiritual successor of sorts.

Deadlock Could Be The TF2 Follow-Up We’ve All Wanted

Deadlock is Valve’s poorly kept secret spiritual successor to Team Fortress 2. Featuring a similarly cartoonishly stylized art style and a roster of quirky heroes, Deadlock looks set to carve its own place in the overcrowded and saturated hero shooter market. By all accounts, it is very much on its way there, thanks to its blending of numerous experiences like Dota 2, TF2, and Overwatch.

Perhaps the most compelling aspect is Deadlock’s ingeniously designed characters, each with their own distinct look and set of abilities that is sure to help it stand out amongst the ever-so-slightly grounded approach we’ve seen from the likes of Valorant and Highguard. Of course, Valve is yet to release it to the public, with players having been able to access it through closed betas in the past. Frankly, I can easily see Deadlock becoming just as popular as its Valve-produced predecessors, but then it does feel as if the consensus toward the hero shooter genre has soured somewhat.

That’s not to say Deadlock will go the way of Concord or even Highguard, but that it may struggle to find the same foothold as TF2 did all the way back in 2007, when the genre was lesser-known, and Valve had a far greater presence in the video game industry (at least when it comes to game production). Nevertheless, if Team Fortress 2’s lasting legacy and continued excellence all these years later is anything to go by, then I have no doubts that Valve will deliver another timeless masterpiece that many will create formative memories of alongside their friends, moreish snacks, and plenty of laughs.

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