I genuinely don't understand how this game has garnered the praise that it has for the story and its characters. Every chapter is filled with a mcguffin or a deus ex machina type reveal that removes all possibility of increasing stakes or tension. And the characters are so bland, I feel like Mario in Paper Mario somehow is more endearing and that dude doesn't have any dialogue.
The combat does rule though and the pixel art clearly has so much care put into it which combined were barely enough to carry me to the ending.

Also what is it with games that make you hunt down collectibles that are frustratingly difficult to find or lack record keeping of which ones you've found in order to reach a "true ending".