Gestalt: Steam & Cinder

As a fan of the genres involved, primarily the Metroidvania loop of combat, exploration, and secret-hunting, Gestalt was very worthwhile to me, and seeing the character design of the player and reading about her using a sword and a gun, the game gave me what I wanted.

Gestalt: Steam & Cinder is an enjoyable Metroidvania; it has all the caveats you might expect, from a simple yet robust melee combat system to a straightforward RPG/point-based upgrade tree and a light equipment system.

Graphics are quite gorgeous on the other hand, I would definitely call the visuals one of the stronger points.

It looks good, but it doesn't look amazing; the soundtrack is good, but there's a number of tracks that are just tepid; the moveset you have access to feels good, but half the moves arrest your movement; the enemies are varied, but are often designed in such a way that the only viable way to deal with them is to stun them or not interact with their moves entirely.

The art, character design, animation, and music show that a lot of care went into parts of this game, but everything surrounding those elements—story, gameplay design, progression—just doesn’t hold up and drags it down the game down.

It's very weird because the core of the game, the movement and how your character feels to use, was pretty darn solid, albeit with some weirdness with the keybinds.