A sad experience, made all the worse by its wasted potential.

The spritework and animations are gorgeous, absolutely full of character. The soundtrack is strong. The gameplay is fun, the combat and puzzles challenging without feeling punishing. You can tell some of the inspirations directly, like the cooking and hearts/stamina system being stolen straight from Breath Of The Wild.

The story is miserable. John, the main viewpoint character and protagonist early on, spends every single scene doing literally nothing as the plot happens around him, and then has zero interest in what happened or what it means. No agency, no curiosity, no feelings. When you're not directly controlling him he becomes a statue. The first chapter teaches you that everybody else in the plot is either an abuser or a victim. Nothing matters, either people hurt you or they die, or both; but either way they're eventually gone so don't bother becoming attached. The only recurring characters know the plot but act all aloof and mysterious and manipulate events, leaving you frustrated instead of wanting to know more.

And all of it gets in the way of the fun, the exploration and the puzzles and the wonder and the fights against fantastical bio-mechanical horrors. There's something amazing here buried under layer upon layer of cynical tragedy and pointless suffering. It took the wrong lessons from Undertale and Lisa The Painful.