After playing Sea of Stars, I had to check in on this one and it really delivered! Instead of Chrono Trigger this one pays tribute to Ninja Gaiden and other side-scrolling action titles of the 8- and 16-bit eras with banging music and buttery controls. Nice challenge level as well, it nails that fine line betwen retro challenge and outright sadism. When the game has somewhere to go, it's 5 stars no question. When it becomes a metroidvania-esque open-world riddle-solving game, it's... not quite as good. It's more than a little disruptive to be moving forward with so much momentum and then just let it all dissipate. You have this great upgrade tree, and once you fill it—which 100% of players will do in the first half of the game without even trying—that's it. Around the same time you also notice that there's about 20 enemy types total in this entire 15-hour game, which imo is a missed opportunity. But fortunately it all comes roaring back together towards the end with some real showstopping setpieces and fun bosses. And then you see in the credits that it was made by a very small team and the whole thing becomes even more impressive.