Mechanically excellent but would've vastly benefitted from being a traditional platformer rather than a Metroidvania. Areas never connect to each other in any interesting or meaningful ways and half the upgrades are literal keys to locked doors (this happens five times and that's not even counting the upgrades that aren't keys but may as well be like the screw knives and the ice magatama), greatly diluting the exploration--the hidden upgrades help, but they only do so much.

The time stopping is fantastic and the game's existence is worth it for that alone, it's an idea that never gets old and the way it interacts with all the other systems is genius. It's put to many creative uses, but this is further reasoning for why I don't think the Metroidvania structure benefits it much. If the level design had been more focused I think even more mileage could've been squeezed out of this system since it could've justified more complex challenges in every room as you wouldn't be needing to backtrack through them multiple times. Both Guacamelee titles come to mind as games that are kind of open but regularly funnel you through linear gauntlets of platforming challenges that push your moveset to its absolute limit in an incredibly satisfying way that I think could've worked great for Luna Nights too.

In its current state it's difficult for me to not feel that Luna Nights has some major missed potential, but that shouldn't take away from the fact that the rest of it is still solid and contains a lot of clever systems that connect to each other in engaging ways. It's worth a playthrough, but it makes me sad thinking about what it could've been and how close Team Ladybug was to creating a masterpiece.

also the extra stage kind of sucks