Wow was this easier than the previous game! Oh man, what a romp. See, they got it right. Sure, Wily's Castle is a spike, especially the rooms that require the mobility tools just to complete, but the bosses there are a very satisfying change of pace. Plenty of room to master, but without feeling like you had to practice for hours just to-

What's that? Hard mode was the default in Japan? Oh...

What a title screen track! Wily's Castle 1! Wood Man! Oh man!

Never played it as a kid, felt an obligation to check out the origin of the series as an adult. I can see how I eventually would have internalized the game, with endless summer hours to sink first beating, then mastering it. How the songs would drill their way into my subconscious, and become those things you casually hum without even thinking about it years later.

As an adult, I appreciate how much of the series is present from the start, laugh at some of the stranger choices (like having a scoring system at all), and really shake my head at some of the difficulties. Ice Man was the first stage I tried at, and even using save states to ease the tedium, I had to walk away from the section where you jump across Foot Holders.

It's a fun experience, greatly enhanced when you choose to not repeat the sections you know you can do without problem. Above all, I'm grateful that enough people cottoned to it that we got many more.

Shout out to the Fire Man and Elec Man tracks.

I always hated art class. It's the only time my parents had to be called in to have a one on one conference with the teacher. A combination of poor dexterity and perfectionism led to me declaring that I just wouldn't participate. Even to this day, I am intensely self critical of any endeavors that require me to revisit those skills. So it was to my great surprise that this game not only well and truly won me over, but had me painting in ways the game doesn't even require.

Thankfully, cleverly, the game restricts your toolset, especially at the start of the game. Therefore, any painting you do is almost certainly unable to match what you see in your head. You just have to do your best to translate it. The lack of control frees you from the demands of getting it right. The world is also full of things that cause you to splatter paint unintentionally, leaving messy spots that you know aren't your fault. That makes it all the easier to leave them there and make it part of the composition. By the time you gain greater control over your abilities (and they never get so precise as to demand great skill), you've had plenty of opportunity to break free of any expectations you may have for yourself.

The characters around you praise you from the beginning, and it's easy to dismiss it as just the text of the game, which doesn't actually reflect what you do. However, as one of the singular Wielders of The Brush, anything you do really is that exciting to these people, and a style that is forced to be unique from the previous Wielders forcibly sets you apart from comparison. Most importantly, once you start to talk with the previous Wielders, the platitudes that others throw at you begin to lose their insubstantiality, as you see them wrestle with their own faiths and doubts that are so likely to mirror your own.

Throw all of that lovely characterization, game design, and thematic work on top of a thoughtfully crafted world, full of small joys, and a exploration system that is full of just enough smooth puzzles to be satisfying, and you have an entrancing and heartwarming experience. Even to those who feel like "Art is not for them," I would highly recommend Chicory.

Edit: (And the fact that I can write this whole review and somehow forget to mention the beautiful music by Lena Raine underscores how entrancing the whole package is.)

One of those games I could not stop thinking about when I wasn't playing it. It never stopped surprising me with clever details, the sort that make replaying it an absolute joy. So many developers have talked about the inspiration they took from playing games that they did not understand, or even speak the language of, and this is a clear and absolute love letter to that ideal that delivers in spades. The sense of relief and satisfaction when you finally solve an inscrutable puzzle, or put together exactly why a little detail is that way, is an indescribably wonderful feeling. I truly wish there was more too it, because while it wasn't too short of an experience, I was not ready to let go of how this game made me feel.