Pretty similar to the first game in terms of gameplay and mechanics with some changes. The one that pissed me off is guilt, which now covers a lot more of the fervor bar and sometimes gets stuck even if you claim all the guilt fragments (I thought this was a bug, but it's intentional). So yeah, you will have to spend tears of atonement to clear your guilt because, surprise, some bosses are challenging and will require you to take a couple of tries. Apart from that, is pretty good.