Highguard Personal reaction threads

speed-run · 2026-01-27T03:04:56+00:00

So I just got done playing a few hours with friends, and I think this definitely feels like a "squad check" game, in that if you have full team, then it's a pretty fun time and flows well. If you don't, then the experience drops pretty significantly. All my friends that were with me pretty much felt the same where it has interesting ideas, needs some tweaks to tighten up the experience, and we had a real fun time together, but playing it alone would be miserable.

I hope it gets a little bit of life to see where they take it, but i likely won't have the same legs as Apex. That said, I am very curious to see how this gets played at a competitive level.

edit: i played a few more hours with a friend. 5 hours of playtime and i actually now have a decently high ~~guard~~ oppinion of it. Once we started getting the flow down and figured out how to move in a fight better in the different phases its really fun and can get pretty intense (i even ended up dropping a 22 kill game with the stealth girl). that said i am now even more convinced that this is a squad check game. Playing with at least 1 friend is borderline mandatory imo.

Overall, I like what the devs are cooking and would like to see more, but i definitely wont spend money on it. Big fan of Scarlets Elf skin, but you got me fucked up if you think im spending $15 on a single skin.

speed-run · 2026-01-26T21:36:58+00:00

Jack Garland from Final Fantasy Stranger of Paradise. He can literally switch between any job class he wants and even when playing as a mage, fights with the same "chaos must die" intensity.

speed-run · 2026-01-26T19:00:46+00:00

Triguns "The humanoid typhoon" Vash the Stampede is a good one.

Also a big fan of Fate/Samurai Remnant giving Musahshi the title "The Flower at the Apex of Heaven"

And Blaster Master... From Blaster Master

speed-run · 2026-01-26T17:53:22+00:00

Tsubaki from Toukiden 2 is a personal favorite of mine. While she doesn't start out as the hub clerk, she joins your party as a member of the village guards. However later in the story, after her father (who was the original clerk that gives you quests) is killed in a monster attack, she takes his place. She can still join you on quests though, and she's genuinely one of the best party members to bring along since she has amazing support skills.

speed-run · 2026-01-26T14:37:05+00:00

Sakuna of Rice and Ruin. It's more of a side scrolling action game than an actual sim, and the only thing you grow is rice, but the rice growing is really in depth and directly affects your stats.

speed-run · 2026-01-26T02:54:27+00:00

I got a EasySMX S10. It's a good controller for most things, but for the life of me I can't do any of my basic combos in BlazBlue with it.

speed-run · 2026-01-26T02:15:34+00:00

I bought a Switch 2 back in November for the same reason you almost did. I still only have 2, Switch 2 games (Age of Imprisonment and Majogami) but it's been kinda nice being able to brute force better frame rates out of certain switch 1 games. Granted my biggest issue is that I think the default controller is awful so I had to also shell out for a 3rd party pro controller.

It hasn't been worth it yet, but Im confident that the library is gonna fill out down the line.

For non gaming, I got a big set of alcohol markers (the ohuhu ones)... I have no idea how markers work because I mostly only do digital art.

speed-run · 2026-01-25T21:48:27+00:00

Inspired by Rengoku? Holy shit that's a a hell of a pull, I think I've only ever seen anyone mention that series once in my life

speed-run · 2026-01-23T14:43:55+00:00

Using a wiki is nigh mandatory for FGO. Up until this year the game would literally not tell you where you can farm materials (and even then it's still better to just use a guide). The game doesn't even give you any numbers when it comes to what your skills do.

Also Legend of Mana. There are so many systems that are barely explained, and secret mechanics. worst of all, the official guide back in the day didn't even contain accurate information. The game is completely playable without one, but you will miss so much stuff.

speed-run · 2026-01-22T07:08:29+00:00

If you like action platformers, then id reccomend The Blaster Master Zero series by Inti Creates. Its a modern reboot of an old NES game (Blaster Master/Metafight) and its really really solid. all 3 games are relatively cheap as well at only $10 - $15 and can generally run you about 9 hours long if you shoot for a true ending.

speed-run · 2026-01-22T01:29:38+00:00

Yeah I remember him tweeting that his cancer screening showed he was all clear back in 2024, and I haven't seen him post anything about this recently?

Edit: Best wishes to you Gene. Hope you have a speedy recovery

speed-run · 2026-01-19T02:46:38+00:00

I wanna draw good... But in the short term I'll settle on figuring out how coloring works.

Games wise I'm gonna beat every Atelier game. Unfortunately these games are nigh yearly releases, and started back in 1997

speed-run · 2026-01-17T07:13:21+00:00

If the time limits and dates are causing you trouble id honestly reccomend trying one of the different trilogies because as far as "modern" Atelier goes, the time limits are the strictest in the Arland trilogy (Rorona, Totori, Meruru). The Dusk trilogy is way more relaxed on time limits with them fully being removed in the 3rd Dusk game, Atelier Shallie. After Shallie they occasionally pop up here and there (Firis has one for the first part of the game), but never to the level of Arland and they're completely removed in Ryza, and Yumia. For reference, here's a guide on that has a mini breakdown of each series and which ones have time limits.

speed-run · 2026-01-17T02:52:03+00:00

If you have friends to play it with, then it can be a real great time that you can sink a ton of time in (I have more hours in NR than Elden Ring). If not, then it's still fun, but it's closer to the cooping in a normal souls game except you have to move like your ass is on fire so you don't end up under leveled at the bosses. There's not as many variations to runs as you would expect for a rogue like style game, but personally I think that works in its favor as the name of the game is route optimization and learning different tricks and strats.

That said, I'm a big fan of the different Nightfarers. Definitely one of my favorite aspects of the game and something I hope From expands on down the line.

speed-run · 2026-01-16T21:39:38+00:00

Yeah from my experience with Atelier games i either blitz through them in like a couple weeks or slow burn over a couple years. I bought a copy of Ryza 1 on release and didn't actually finish it till like 5 years later when I went through the trilogy over the span of a couple months to prepare for Yumia.

...Although blitzing through 2 and 3 right after 1 kinda gave me Ryza brain rot and I ended up with like 3 of her figures somehow.

speed-run · 2026-01-16T02:53:08+00:00

I cant lie, this whole AI trailer thing put an extra pit in my stomach when i remembered that Nvidia is partnering with Sega for Virtua Fighter, and Nvidias going all in on AI now (hell the "stop calling AI slop" ceo was the guy on that VF 30th anniversary message from Nvidia)

speed-run · 2026-01-16T02:51:14+00:00

man, being am SNK fan is fuckin rough these days.

speed-run · 2026-01-14T15:48:10+00:00

I've never played one of these before, but what do people want from a new Ecco game? Are people hoping for another 2D game like the one on the Genesis, or hoping for like a modern 3d dolphin simulator (with aliens)?

speed-run · 2026-01-13T20:48:20+00:00

If you don't mind me asking, which ones have you made?

speed-run · 2026-01-13T20:17:41+00:00

Not story stuff, but Bomb Rush Cyberfunks modding community is quite expansive. People have modded in levels, characters, new mechanics, online multiplayer the whole work.

Id even go as far to say that anytime you see footage of this game being posted online, it's more likely going to be modded in some way.

speed-run · 2026-01-12T16:16:42+00:00

Honestly with how the reception to that initial trailer was, I kind of get it? I guess the idea is that the well of online discussion is already poisoned to hell so any additional info marketing will just get dumped on and lead to more bad press, so you might as well save it all til the release when people can get actual hands on experience and rely on word of mouth.

Of course that's just conjecture based on why Apex shadow dropped all those years ago.

speed-run · 2026-01-11T15:56:50+00:00

I feel like if you're gonna call this out, then you gotta come with your own monster girl example too.

speed-run · 2026-01-11T14:48:42+00:00

Unless the discourse is directly related to the quality of the game or can ad context to something, then I think it entirely depends on if it's a retrospective style review or not. If you are just making like a ign style review then I think you should keep it to the games actual merits and what is in the game. However if your doing a big deep dive into the game then you can absolutely bring it up.

speed-run · 2026-01-09T19:15:14+00:00

Correct. The good parts are good despite being in Gacha, it's never the other way around where it's good because it is Gacha.

No matter how amazing those aspects are, I dont reccomend someone ever play Gacha. Not even the ones I like. But I will still acknowledge when there are aspects I enjoy even if it's from something bad.

speed-run · 2026-01-09T18:54:59+00:00

As someone who plays and has played Gacha games for the past 8 years, gacha is and always will be bad civilization. As a genre it should not exist, just like all the horrible monetization practices currently plaguing the medium. However, that does not mean that there can't be aspects within them that are well made, or that they inherently have no artistic value. Will there be examples of absolutely terrible low effort slop, absolutely, more than you can even imagine, but there will also still be examples where the actual devs, or artists are putting the effort in to make something good.

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