Enemy's guard spam isn't that much of a problem since it only starts in the mid game and by that point you should already have tiger drop and komaki parry (which is busted in this game), unfortunately the sidequests (save for few exceptions) were rather poorly done and the random encounters were annoying.
however all of this is (mostly) saved by the godsend that is the plot, won't spoil very much but it's genuinely great and I didn't have any issues with the slow-burn almost slice of life start, on the contrary, it was one of the strongest points in the game.