---
title: 'The Relic: First Guardian Review'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=WSiEZV1MqVc'
video_id: 'WSiEZV1MqVc'
date: 2026-07-31
duration_sec: 715
---

# The Relic: First Guardian Review

> Source: [The Relic: First Guardian Review](https://youtube.com/watch?v=WSiEZV1MqVc)

## Summary

The Relic: First Guardian is a soulslike action game review that contrasts it with another game called Guardian. The reviewer finds The Relic heavily inspired by From Software titles but failing to meet their quality bar, citing poor visuals, technical issues, and lackluster writing, despite some engaging combat and a few compelling stories.

### Key Points

- **Two games compared** [00:02] — Guardian looks like a solid beadless action game, while The Relic is inspired by From Software but doesn't come close to that high bar.
- **Poor visual presentation** [00:53] — Character models have poor fidelity, the world looks like a dead realm, and color filters (yellow, orange-red) become oppressive and make details hard to see.
- **Technical geometry issues** [02:27] — Players can get stuck in geometry, sink into the ground at checkpoints, and find fast travel points embedded inside walls, making them useless.
- **Breadcrumb exploration** [02:55] — The game uses notes and records left in the world as breadcrumbs leading to points of interest, but overuses this storytelling technique.
- **Compelling folklore stories** [03:44] — Some stories rooted in Korean folklore are moving, like one about a wife waiting for her husband, ending with a haunting field of pinwheels; however, boss fights are often awkwardly wedged into these narratives.
- **Loot economy breaks** [04:28] — Hundreds of loot markers yield only 30-50 gold and by the third act you carry more gold than you can spend, making map marker clearing feel pointless.
- **Bad localization and voice acting** [05:11] — Dialogue feels machine-translated without localization, lines are clumsy, and voice performances are generally poor with some takes that should never have shipped.
- **Combat fundamentals** [06:21] — Five distinct weapons each have only one combo string requiring proper timing; sluggish controls make the rhythm a chore, and only defensive options cost stamina, encouraging aggression.
- **Enemy design flaws** [07:11] — Regional enemies look like weak imitations of the From Software aesthetic, regular fodder fails to challenge, and groups are dangerous due to a janky lock-on system and camera.
- **Bosses and their frustrations** [08:12] — Over 75 bosses exist (mostly optional), but many rely on tedious tactics, environmental hazards, and un-interruptible status effects; one boss even failed to spawn, leaving an empty room.
- **Skill trees and respec** [09:11] — Each weapon has a two-sided skill tree allowing distinct playstyles, but relic points are scarce and can't be grinded; respecing is easy via a common item.
- **Relics instead of leveling** [10:17] — Relics modify stats and add customization, but many are basic; some offer invincibility on fatal damage, yet the game fails to explain what 'special attacks' are.

### Conclusion

The Relic: First Guardian has the bones of a notable action game with energetic combat, but its shambolic technical state, poor writing, and frustrating design choices drag it down into being a barely polished gem. Fans of the genre may find some enjoyment, but it's a tough recommendation.

## Transcript

Guardian looks like it could be a solid addition to the growing ranks of beadless action games that punch above their weight. A sort of recommendation you drop your friends looking for something to scratch their itch between
big games to let them know you're really into this action game lifestyle for real. Up close, The Relic is the exact opposite. It's clearly inspired by the From Software lineage, but doesn't even come close to meeting the high bar they
goals well. >> I can't believe it. He was always so >> Shoddy and broken throughout, barely propped up by its engaging combat, and
let down by how lackluster or straight up unacceptable every other piece of it up unacceptable every other piece of it is.
Visually, The Rug does not make a good first or even second impression. either run-of-the-mill medieval European fantasy peasants, knights, and
preachers, or designs out of place enough to be curious, but feeling incomplete, like your [music] Bloodborne doll standin, Eliza. area. >> The fidelity of these models are poor
all around. This is what your character looks like in the menu screen. The lands you explore have the mood of a dead world with how most of its settlements are ghost towns and all the fortresses are ruins. And yet they all look nearly
another. The few towns that do still have people in them feel almost >> No way. >> The mix of geography and whatever hazy color filter is fogging everything up is the biggest indicator of which of the
three main regions you're in. Here's Minty Greenland. This place has that yellow glow that the movie set in the Middle East in the 2010s used. These color filters get oppressive in Burning Villages where everything has an orangey
red glow that makes details like pathways to progress hard to find and the overall image quality looks smudged. Then you have the caves that artificially narrow your vision range by darkening the edges around the screen,
[screaming] [groaning] could avoid getting stuck on random geometry aloing waist deep into the
geometry aloing waist deep into the ground at a checkpoint. stairs into a weird tower can be tempting, but sometimes it just leads to
time spent trying to understand how a fast travel point ended up completely embedded inside a wall, inaccessible, and completely useless. It's very easy into side quests or dungeons around the corner because records left behind by
countryside, leading you into points of interest like a breadcrumb trail. by your character, making Batman-like deductions based on some sort of
noteworthy thing in the environment, like a broken cart, or told in the voice conveniently left progressively revealing notes behind right before the >> Beautiful vial she treasured caught my eye. It was gleaming gold, and its
surface was engraved with a strange symbol. Seriously, I know every game does a version of this kind of storytelling, but The Relic really technique with a frequency and reckless abandon I don't think I've seen before.
Korean folklore are somewhat compelling, even moving at times. They tend to follow the formula of a sad story leads to a boss fight, but they don't all end with a bang. One story had me trekk up a mountain reading scraps of notes from a
wife waiting for her husband to return as her daughter gets more and more anxious playing with pinw wheels to pass the time. At the top of the climb was just a grassy plateau filled almost hauntingly with pin wheels presumably
left there by a daughter who eventually stopped waiting. I liked the rare occasions when a story resolved in a subversive way and was disappointed when these kinds of stories had boss fights wedged into them awkwardly.
meaningful value in the relic. The rolling hills, deep forest, and dank dungeons of its world have hundreds of shiny little loot markers scattered into every nook and cranny, and almost all of them are just a scant pile of 30 to 50
guarded by bad guys or tucked at the end of a divergent path in a cave, and almost all of them have about 600 gold. If you're wondering, that's weirdly specific. Well, so did I. until about 20 hours in when I stopped touching any of
carrying more gold than I could responsibly spend by the third act. As someone who genuinely enjoys clearing map markers in games, my 30 or so hours with the relic was the first time I can remember being turned off at the idea of
remember being turned off at the idea of getting them altogether. overwritten and put together in a strange way that suggests it was essentially put through translation software without any other linguistic
touch or localization effort. >> Welcome home to the young man who has returned. We're glad he survived and made it back from Eden. >> This goes for most dialogue as well. Whenever I think a shopkeeper or guard
easedropping on is done, more lines of dialogue keep pouring out clumsily. Every time I strike the hammer, I think of my daughter. It's why my hands have grown more precise.
>> Even worse is the generally poor voice [music] performances across the board. >> It was thrilling to kill that girl. It was so funny how she cried and shouted >> I almost couldn't believe that some of the takes I heard made it into the final
game. >> Save me, please. Just me, please. >> Save me, please. Just me, please. [groaning] roam the land is where the relic is at its most cohesive, but that's a
relatively low bar that it barely clears. Each of the five available weapons are distinct from one another, while each one only has one combo string. You can't just mash it out since each subsequent swing requires proper
timing. The sluggish responsiveness from the controls make this rhythm a chore to lock down in the early game, and I found myself dropping strings that felt right even after some practice. Only your defensive options cost stamina,
encouraging you to be aggressive more freely. Like you, enemies can be stunned when they've run out of stamina through either your attacks or when you parry theirs. But it's frustrating that they don't have visible stamina bars, so
you'll never know how close they are to a full stagger until it happens. >> Each of the three regions have their own key roster of bad guys specific to them,
but none of the regular FOD or test your skills all that regularly on their own. harm. Groups of monsters are the most dangerous [music]
due in part to the janky lock on system and jittery camera becoming wolffully and jittery camera becoming wolffully unreliable. like this guy, enemies don't have the visual appeal worthy of a top tier grim
dark fantasy world. They feel like they are trying to ape the twisted nature of the from software aesthetic. After a while, they just become annoyances, not valuable for farming materials since they only drop middling amounts of gold
or low-level crafting items that I could just go buy somewhere. By the late game, I would do my best to completely avoid them out in the world. running past them to the next checkpoint while in dungeons as I ran out of patience for the Nazis.
in both of these respects, as their attacks create way more of a puzzle to solve and generally look more detailed and more interesting than the run-of-the-mill mukes. But these fights are also where I had to employ the most
tedious tactics in order to avoid the cheapest deaths. There are a lot of bosses, over 75 to be clear, and most of them are optional. The worst of these take advantage of the relic's affforementioned technical woes, while
environmental hazards, status effects offense that you can't reliably interrupt.
example, this lady who didn't even bother to show up at all when I respawned, leaving me in an empty room that they could occasionally fire into, which I couldn't leave without reloading my entire set.
spice up combat, adding some punchy offensive and defensive options into the offensive and defensive options into the mix. weapon, the more complete they feel with a more fleshed out move set. And each
weapon has a two-sided skill tree that firmly divides them into even more distinct play styles. The battle staff is a good example of this with one side making you a dangerous whirlwind in melee and the other giving you some very
fills [music] the role of a traditional mage. However, the massive amount of relic points required to unlock all of these skills in any one path will make it hard to see the full scope of any style before the very late game. You
can't grind these points either, as they only come either as reward from certain boss fights or some quests or can be found as specific blue shrines out in the world. With an item that is really easy to come by, you can refund any
points invested and respspec it as you see fit. I did this many times in order play styles if I thought a new approach was needed to get through a new boss.
drawbacks, some of which have pronounced effects on combat. Relics are stones that modify or enhance your stats and add an extra layer of customization. With some outside of the box thinking, these can bring flare to your builds,
which worked well enough where I didn't even care that much that there is no regular stat progression or leveling up at all. Most relics are basic, raising hit points or stamina, bolstering defenses, and so on, but some can offer
invincibility when you take fatal damage. with special attacks that seem like they would be a cool combo. But like most of
the sloppy design of the relic, it didn't explain which special attacks they applied to or even what a special attack was at all.
Guardian is all the potential it squanders. It is the bones of something that could have grown to be a notable action game, especially in its energetic combat. But everything about this experience, including its combat, is
marred in some way by its own shambolic state. The janky subtitles and sometimes straight up terrible visual quality could be tolerated, but the relic is inexcusable ways. It's a gem that's barely cut, let alone polished.
Campaign Evolved or our final review of Cow. And for anything else in the world Cow. And for anything else in the world of video games, stick with IG.