I really wanted to like this game as I found the art style and animation very nostalgic while being fresh at the same time. I'd like to start with the positives, as it wasn't all bad:
The good.
- Great art style. I really enjoyed the almost claymation/Mortal Kombat flair to it. The cutscenes were also all well done.
- The voice acting was pretty good overall, and I enjoyed the main character and his little cat companion Chisai.
- The unique death scenes were unexpected and all brutal and cool (except when the physics were the reason they were happening, will get to that).
The bad.
- The platforming can be absolutely abysmal at times. Due to both physics related glitches, bad hit detection and the like, I died more to one glitched out jump than I did to any of the bosses (see video). I've included one of the jumps (I died about 15 times before it suddenly decided to grab), but at least 3 separate times I died in similar ways on these sorts of grabs.
- No movement options means that the general exploration was not fun and very repetitive. It really gave me flashbacks to playing a bad rented SNES or Genesis game from the rental store.
- the gameplay changeups (the kodama and Chisai) were either not unique (only once section was different functionally than playing the samurai, which was the wall climbing section) or actively worse because you no longer had access to any items (kodama).
- several saves just didn't work for me. The section right before Gashadokuro just would not save, so when I died fighting that boss, I had to fight the boss right before again as well.
- Enemy variety is really bad. They had an ok assortment of enemies, but the problem was their way of making you fight them. There were many sections where you fought the same exact enemy 10 times in a row, with no variation of enemy types at all.
- you could soft lock yourself as the kodama in several areas by not having the energy to blow up walls because there were not enemies around to provide the energy.
- I used a lock pick I believe two separate times to open a door with... Only a lock pick inside?
- Bosses were super underwhelming. I felt that way especially with the final boss.
- Combos didn't necessarily feel important to switch between different combo types.
- Hit detection in general didn't feel great.
- some enemies could wail on you and barely do damage while some touched you once for an entire health bar.
- the stealth sections were not always obvious on when you could move and when you'd be seen.
I hate how much I didn't like the game and unfortunately would not recommend it to others. I don't even really care that it wasn't a true Metroidvania, it just didn't do anything in particular very well.
I'm sorry if this is your favorite game, but if you enjoyed it, what parts did you actually enjoy enough to leave with a positive feeling about it?