I’ve played this as a palate cleanser after DS2, and I’m glad to say that even when I avoided the game’s pre release hype as I don’t assume that indie spiritual successors are good by default it turned out to be a very neat experience.

The story was surprisingly decent, nothing huge, but it tries to have some character which is good since it was going to feel very tacky if it felt like they’re aiming to make their own JSR3.
The gameplay is actually faithful to its inspiration at least from memory, and all the new ideas are welcome even if the execution is not really the best (why did they decide to add combat and why it worked this way?) but there is a solid foundation for a very good sequel if it happens.
Also, I didn’t expect the music to be different in sound but similar in spirit to what you can expect in a game like this, to be fair there are some meh songs over the course of the game, they’re the type of tracks that you’d hate if you hear them outside, but it’s fine if you hear it in game since it works with the overall feel and setting, but that’s an exception and not the rule as the majority of the songs here are actually enjoyable.
It's very good for a first attempt, I’m going to keep this installed in case I want to chill for a bit with mods and custom music until they decide to make a better sequel.