“Bible Adventures was the big one we got – I think that might have been the very first one we even tried to get. We’re big fans of it here – there’s a book by Gabe Durham that’s all about the history of that game and its developer, Wisdom Tree, and how they skirted the law to sell bootleg NES carts. It’s such a crazy story, and it’s an honor to feature the game here. I won’t spoil the other ones, but Bible Adventures does get featured hugely in the game during [a boss fight]. I’m really proud of that part – it took a lot of work and we did it just because it made us laugh and seemed like an insane thing to commit to.”
But alongside the jokes that come with huge amounts of planning, there are also ones that sprung up by chance – game development’s “improv”, perhaps. Throughout a creative process there will no doubt be surprises along the way, elements you had not expected, or chances to take that just happen to work out. In the case of High On Life 2, that came in the form of the tutorial to help get you on the new skateboard for the first time.
“It’s very early on in the game, and to teach the player how to use their new skateboard we have Gene look up a video online, and he shows it to you,” Robbins tells me. “The video is just something I shot with my friend Jon Millstein, a skater and comedian, with my phone in a parking lot near the Los Angeles Zoo. I wrote this long monologue for Jon to read, full of specific game controls and instructions, and he memorized it nearly on the spot in an alien mask. It’s one of my favorite parts of the game and it came together quickly on the cheap, at the last minute. We shot it in an hour, I went home and edited it that night, and by the next day it was already in the game. That’s the Squanch magic!”
This “magic” is what holds the ambitiously hilarious High On Life 2 together, through crisp writing, creative gameplay (skateboards!), and an incredibly immersive world for us to explore. It’s developed with a swagger, confident that their sense of humor will resonate with enough of us to take even bigger swings at turning “fun to play” into “funny.” High On Life 2 is about to show us what can happen when a group of creative game developers craft something that’s centered around a singular purpose: To make us laugh our asses off.
High On Life 2 is doing the things you’d expect this sequel to do – it’s bigger, more packed with jokes, even more experimental than the first game, and now has a skateboard you can use at any time (naturally). But it’s also doing something we didn’t expect: changing the first game’s structure fundamentally. High On Life 2 is taking cues from Metroidvania games, but using them to its own ends.
In an episode of the Official Xbox Podcast, Squanch Games’ COO & Executive Producer, Matty Studivan, and Creative & Art Director, Mikey Spano explained – among many other things – about how the team changed their thinking to offer a whole new hub-based design for the game.
“Our Design Director, Erich Meyr, and I early on decided we wanted to do something that had Metroidvania elements to it, but we also wanted to support telling really tight stories,” explained Spano. “So, this time around, we tried to keep all of the Metroidvania elements in the hubs.”
While the original High On Life was built around a single hub, Blim City, the sequel will take you to three different hubs, each with a lot more to them and, in classic Metroidvania style, offering more and more interactions the more you play and earn.
“It’s a big step up for us from the first game,” said Studivan. “If you played it and you know Blim City, it’s a really cool spot, but pretty small geographically.”
“We have three decent-sized hubs in [High On Life 2],” adds Spano, “and each one of those hubs has a lot of little side things you can do, NPCs you can find, tons of collectibles, tons of unlockable things. And obviously with the skateboard; there’s a lot of cool stuff related to the skateboard that you can do in the hubs.”
The change is effectively about letting Squanch have their cake and eat it – the new structure means that the team can pack in the stupendously weird moments that made High On Life beloved, without needing to derail the core story to get non-sequitur jokes in there. It’s an elegant mix:
“In terms of how it all flows together, you’ve got your home base that you’re always returning to,” explained Spano. “And in there, you’re talking to your crew about what you’re going to do next. And then, you’ll be dropped down into the hub. And then from there, you’re navigating to a target that you’re following. But once you get to a certain point, it triggers a more linear experience where we can tell the story in a tighter way. We still always have choices that you’re making and stuff like that.
“But in terms of finishing a level and then coming back with new power-ups, we try to keep all that in the hub so that we can tell a complete story without needing players to come back and hear the same things over and over again.”
The upshot is that Squanch can tell the story they want to, but give players the freedom to step away and explore just how odd the surrounding world is at their leisure. To help create all that side content, Squanch took a very fun approach:
“One of the ways we were able to do that is that we do game jams at the studio, because the entire team is so creative,” added Studivan. “And so, we had eight or nine teams [jam] for a week – and I think like seven of the game jams are in the hubs in this game.”
It should make exploring the hubs rewarding in itself – with entire other game types hidden away, every discovery can become something new. We’ll get more of what we learned to expect from the first game, too – High On Life included entire, real-life movies to watch, and that will return (with a movie theater to watch them in). We also know that Squanch has licensed full games (NES game Bible Adventures formed a pivotal part of the demo we recently played) that will appear along the way.
“We’re spending a lot more resources and time on [side content]. It really makes the world feel like you’re somewhere lived-in,” said Studivan.
The big changes to structure are also about catering to different kinds of players. Those who just want the story can jump from main mission to main mission without friction. Those who want to do everything can do so without having to repeat missions, and at their own pace. And there are also those who might waver between quick blasts and marathon sessions:
“So, with the missions, we try to keep them at a certain length so that if you’re like, ‘I’m going to go take down this bounty,’ you actually can finish it in a night and then get back to putting your kids to bed or whatever it is that you have to do,” said Spano. “And then for the gamers that want a more free-form experience, they know they can just hang out in the hub for a while and do whatever they want and take on missions whenever they want.”
For a game that presents itself as unabashedly dumb, there’s a core of smart, classic game design thinking sitting beneath all the madness. With that design in place, it allows Squanch to go as wild as they want with the ideas we, as players, will interact with.
Even in the earliest looks at the game, we’re seeing how far they can push this – one boss fight suddenly sees your enemy hack your game, sending you navigating your own menu screens to fight him off. And, best of all:
“That’s one of the more normal parts of the game,” Spano said. “This demo is early in the game. By Act Three it’s just so off the rails and insane. I think people are going to be really surprised.”
I’m very much looking forward to seeing how much weirder this can get – High on Life 2 arrives for Xbox Series X|S and Xbox on PC on February 13, 2026, and will be available on day one with Game Pass Ultimate.
If you want to hear much, much more about the game, make sure to check out the full Official Xbox Podcast episode, which dives into how Squanch turned around a sequel so quickly, the difficult art of writing comedy for games, the benefits of switching to Unreal Engine 5 and… the wonder of Microsoft Excel.
High On Life 2
Squanch Games, Inc.
☆☆☆☆☆
★★★★★
You’ve done it. You’ve taken down an intergalactic cartel, brought humanity back from the brink of extinction, and hunted dangerous bounties to the far corners of the galaxy. Bounty hunting has brought you fortune, fame and love; but when a mysterious figure from your past reappears and puts a price on your sister’s head, your cushy life gets thrown into chaos.
Do you have what it takes to risk it all and bring down an intergalactic conspiracy that once again threatens your favorite species (humans)?
High On Life RETURNS as you and your beloved rag-tag team of alien misfits shoot, stab, and skate your way through gorgeous, dangerous worlds all across the galaxy to blow up the EVIL pharmaceutical conglomerate hell-bent on putting price tags on HUMAN LIFE!
Justin Roiland, creator of TV series Rick and Morty and the recently released High on Life game, has been charged with domestic violence against a former girlfriend.
NBC News reports that it obtained Orange County Superior Court records stating that a criminal complaint was filed against Roiland back in May 2020 by the Orange County District Attorney. The complaint charges Roiland with “one felony count of domestic battery with corporal injury and one felony count of false imprisonment by menace, violence, fraud and/or deceit.” Roiland was arrested and released with a $50,000 bond in August 2020 and pleaded not guilty to both charges in October of that same year.
According to NBC News the victim says the incident between herself and Roiland occurred around Jan. 19 of that year. A protective order was filed in October 2020, which states that Roiland can not harass, threaten, surveil, or be within 100 feet of an unknown person protected under the order. The order also made Roiland relinquish ownership of any firearms he owned or possessed. The order lasts until October 2023. According to NBC News, Roiland is scheduled to appear in court Thursday for a pre-trial hearing.
This news comes shortly after the release of High on Life, a first-person shooter game created by Roiland’s video game company, Squanch Games. Despite the game’s popularity on Game Pass, Xbox’s Netflix-like game subscription service, it’s been at the center of controversy for its use of an AI generator to create poster art and vocal performances. Prior to High on Life’s release on December 13, Roiland launched two NFT projects in 2021 and 2022 called The Best I Could Do and Art Gobblers.
