So I got to the top of the castle. I beat the boss up there, and then the game asks me to do it all again, but with all the stuff I found on the way up. I was bored on the way up. I'm not playing through these levels again with access to a few rooms i couldn't get into before. No thanks.

I was bored on the way up, and I'm not going to bother to continue to be bored. If you like Castlevania, anime girls and a really bland story, you could do better than this.

It's fun if you're playing coop with a friend. I wouldn't play it alone. Though, I gotta say, the game art sprites, pixel art etc all look really good!

First played this, I didn't really understand any of the design decisions and felt it was pretty shallow. However, I went into the back catalog and played through Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon 1 & 2. This made me realize it wasn't actually a metroidvania really that much at all, but was a spiritual successor to the original Bloodstained games. For context, I had never played a Castlevania either and realized that's what I was missing, having played and love/hate'd both games because they really were SotN-like games.

Playing through it again, I really enjoyed it with the mechanics I suffered through in CotM1 & 2 because of the more free-form combat, mainly aerial maneuverability really solving a lot of the knockback to give you more options.

Another thing to realize is the "Gal" part of the title actually has to do with Gal*Guns franchise, so it at least explained the heavy weeb tropes which if you watch any anime, it's pretty tame by comparison.

Mechanics were decent and more forgiving with the resuscitate ability if you lose one of the gals while still having a % of HP from a boss chipped away. Overall a lot more forgiving and has some hidden tech to make traversal even smoother once you learn what does what.

Really just wish I had a map, while the compass at least gets you going in the right direction for collectables/rescues, I'd have to run back/forth a few times to get my bearings.

Only played through the normal ending on Veteran, but can tell that it follows the same format as CosM games with additional endings, albeit far more forgiving since you could easily go back more quickly than the predecessors.

Overall not a gem, but a pretty good game that if you understand the developer history or enjoy Castlevania-like, you'll likely enjoy this.