High Score Girl is a story that begins in an arcade in 1991, the year of the unprecedented fighting game boom. Due to various reasons, the series was forced to be suspended, and the anime adaptation was also scrapped. The situation was so muddy that everyone had given up on High Score Girl after that, but after various things were resolved, it was decided to resume the serialization and make an anime. I would like to introduce the character of Yaguchi Haruo, the protagonist of "High Score Girl" who achieved a dramatic continuation.
Yaguchi Haruo, a boy obsessed with the charm of games
For Haruo, a boy who is neither good at sports nor good at studying, games are an oasis in life, the only thing he can be proud of. He has a gaming brain that thinks about games all the time, and he also likes to play action games and RPGs, but he especially loves fighting games, and he loves to make fun of his opponents, tease them, and in some cases, he is a model fighting gamer who is hungry for victory and is not afraid to use traps that would inevitably lead to a real fight.
The protagonist is sadly game-brained
Source: High Score Girl
It's safe to say that she devoted her youth to games, and she thinks about games all the time. Because of the influence of the Genpei Touma-den, when she went on a school trip to Kyoto, she imagined a sinister magical land, when she was taking exams she replaced the things she was studying with games, and when she was getting her moped license she imagined a racing game. Her gaming brain is activated in all sorts of situations.
About Kyoto in Genpei Toumaden
Source: High Score Girl
Haruo's favorite game, Genpei Toumaden, is a classic side-scrolling action arcade game that has also been ported to the PC Engine and X68000. Some people may know it because it appeared in the PS2 festival collaboration game ``NAMCOXCAPCOM.'' The Kyoto stage in Genpei Toumaden is a magical stage infested with aliens, unlike the other stages. The reason for this is that it was originally inspired by ``Heiankyo Alien.''
Innocent gamer Haruo Yaguchi
Source: High Score Girl
Haruo shows his nasty side when it comes to games, but he also has an innocent personality that enjoys games purely, and when it comes to games, he shows extreme initiative, and he spends his time in the enchanted world of arcades, where people's true natures are revealed. Perhaps because he plays fighting games where even a single pixel can lead to a reversal, he is strong in adversity and has a surprisingly calm and courageous side even when in trouble. Some people, like Koharu and Miyao, are attracted to his unpretentious personality.
Fighting gamers are bad at giving up?
There is a slang term in fighting games, "shinayasu." It means "it's cheap if you don't die," and if you're alive, there is a chance of a comeback. Recently, there have been more games where even if you only have one dot of health, you can reduce it by 100% with one combo and make a huge comeback. In general, fighting gamers are bad at giving up, and strong players remain calm even when under attack. Haruo's strength in adversity may have been cultivated by fighting games.
"Haruo Yaguchi" has high durability
Source: High Score Girl
If there's one thing Haruo can be proud of outside of games, it's that he's extremely resilient. Even after being hit by the black luxury car driven by the Ohno family butler many times, he is physically strong enough to bounce back within a few minutes of Ohno's attacks, who is not good at expressing his emotions and expresses his dissatisfaction and protest through violence. He is also mentally strong enough to use his frustration as a springboard to bounce back even after being beaten to a pulp by Koharu, who had been honing her fighting game skills during the time she had been away from arcades after failing her entrance exams.
Yaguchi Haruo is a kind and easy-going person! ?
Source: High Score Girl
Perhaps because he likes playing fighting games, where the person who does things that other people dislike wins, he has a bad personality during the game, but he actually cares about others and shows communication skills that allow him to easily get along with other arcade players. Also, he rarely gets unreasonably angry at someone in the story. In fact, he has a very generous personality.
He is extremely insensitive to other people's kindness
Source: High Score Girl
Haruo is a gamer who thinks about games all the time and has nothing but games on his mind, so he is terribly insensitive to other people's kindness. He is completely unaware of Koharu's feelings for him, and due to his indifference, Ohno's sister forces him to play Tokimeki Memorial so that he can learn about women's hearts. However, for someone with a pure gaming brain, understanding women's hearts seems to be extremely difficult, and he even struggles with the romance in the game.
Major Guile, partner of Yaguchi Haruo
Source: High Score Girl
A real character in the original Street Fighter 2, and Haruo's character throughout the series. Perhaps because he was too powerful in the original Street Fighter 2, he has been downgraded with each new installment in the series. In High Score Girl, not only that, but whenever Haruo is about to give up or stop, his inner Major Guile appears and gives him a sonic boom to push him forward. He is Haruo's partner.
The gaming history of genuine gamer Yaguchi Haruo
Haruo is such a fan of arcade games that he chose the PC Engine over the popular SFC at the time. Although he has a wide range of knowledge about all genres, he seems to have strengths and weaknesses, and is good at fighting games but not so good at shooters.
A list of fighting games that Haruo has played
Street Fighter series, King of Fighters series, Fatal Fury series, Virtua Fighter series, Tekken series, Art of Fighting, Darkstalkers series, Mortal Kombat, Samurai Shodown, Kaiser Knuckle, and many others, including Oedo Fight, though there are no scenes of him actually playing them.
List of characters owned by Yaguchi Haruo
Street Fighter series: Guile; Street Fighter ZERO series: Guy; Fatal Fury series: Terry; Samurai Shodown: Gen'an and Hanzo; Virtua Fighter series: Kagemaru; Darkstalkers series: Bishamon, and others. He seems to prefer strong characters with conventional abilities.
Yaguchi Haruo meets the heroine, Ohno Akira
Source: High Score Girl
He meets the heroine, Ohno Akira, at a game center battle table. Ono, who is rich, has excellent grades, and is popular, has achieved the amazing feat of winning 28 games in a row using Zangief, which is difficult to use because it has no projectiles. Ono, who has an inferiority complex, and in order to break his pride and make him feel humiliated, Haruo uses the forbidden tactics of "waiting Guile" and "throwing trap" to win, but they enter a real fight and both are banned. This is how the two met.
What is "waiting Guile"?
In the original Street Fighter 2, a character named Guile is a fierce force. He crouches to the bottom left as seen from the 1P side, and charges up for his projectile "Sonic Boom" and anti-air "Somersault Kick". If the opponent is far away, he uses "Sonic Boom", if they are walking towards him, he uses a crouching kick with a fast start-up and long reach, and if they jump in, he uses "Somersault Kick", which is an infamous strategy that can block almost all of the opponent's actions.
There is a change in his relationship with Ohno
Source: High Score Girl
Haruo, who is full of inferiority complex because he can't study or do sports, is only proud of his gaming skills, which is his only source of comfort. Haruo sees Ohno as an enemy because of his natural gaming skills, but after Ohno receives rigorous special education at Ohno's school and discovers that he finds solace in the occasional arcade getaway, Haruo feels sympathy for Ohno and begins to care about him, such as introducing him to games.
At the end of the elementary school arc, it is decided that Ohno will move overseas
Source: High Score Girl
The two share a common habit of playing games to relieve their frustrations from their cramped environment, and as they begin to bond through games, Haruo begins to think of Ohno as a fellow gamer. However, shortly afterwards, he learns that Ohno will be moving overseas.
Haruo finds out that Ohno is moving abroad...
Source: High Score Girl
Haruo pretends that he can go to the arcade without worrying because his nemesis is gone, but he is cold towards Ohno on the day they say goodbye at school. However, Haruo, who felt like he had a hole in his heart, was pushed by Major Guile to appear in front of Ohno just before he left on his journey and see him off, vowing to hone his skills so that the next time they meet, he will be able to fight on equal terms without relying on "waiting Guile" or "throwing traps".
High Score Girl Yaguchi Haruo Summary
High Score Girl has finally been made into an anime, which we have all been waiting for. It's a nostalgic, game-brained work that we've never seen before, so I'm really looking forward to it. The main character, Haruo, is also a charming character, so I definitely recommend this anime! See for yourself what happens next!
