Would you enjoy this game? This has some similar vibes to Shadow of the Colossus, but I wouldn't compare it to that game directly. The giant creatures are the main focus of the story, but the gameplay is more for people that enjoy traversal-heavy exploration and puzzle-platformer games.

Moment to moment, you're dashing, jumping, gliding around looking for more emblems or crystals, while evading the beasts. Movement feels good, as does the bow. There's a nice little bonus to shooting speed if you can time your shots exactly right, and bouncing off a chain of talismans to cover lots of ground feels great. There is a bit of an issue in some cases getting the targeting to aim at the thing you want, but not enough to spoil the experience. But where are you dashing to and what are you shooting? Actually, mostly you're solving environmental puzzles, which are all pretty well done. Actually fighting the giant beasts is only an occasional punctuation to the puzzling and running.

The medium-term experience of the game is one of trying to search out the items you need to fight back against these looming monsters while trying to avoid said monsters. Getting caught by them is a moment of tension, but ultimately more of a nuisance than anything. You don't have a visible health bar, so it mostly feels like an interruption. But they're usually clearly visible (or the storm around them is anyway) so avoiding them isn't to hard unless you get unlucky. Once you have what you need, you can initiate the boss fight, then you can either move on to the next area, or continue exploring the current now-peaceful area. Exploring feels rewarding as there's lots of little hidden nooks with a few extra crystals, and those crystals provide a meaningful reward by boosting your traversal ability. I don't think you need to find these to beat the game, but it would be harder without.

Should you buy this game for the aesthetics? Maybe. The game has a nice style and it's fun to just run around the world, but it's not such a spectacle as some other giant boss games like Shadow of the Colossus or Solar Ash.

Should you buy this game for the story? Maybe. The story does a good job keeping you moving forward, and you care about the characters, though there's only a few of them of note. The backstory is presented well through the lingering thoughts of the dead scattered around the world, which further incentivizes you to explore. The ending is satisfying and the moral it presents rings true enough.

Should you buy this game for the gameplay? Probably. If you enjoy running around and exploring a world without much in the way of explicit guidance or character interactions, solving puzzles and making a few tricky jumps, then you should enjoy this game.

Of the games I've played where you alternate between two game genres, I'd say this is one of the best. A lot of games like that have trouble making both halves fit together smoothly, either favoring one half or the other, or making it feel like two separate games crammed together, but Sakuna manages to avoid that. You want to take care of your rice and that directly makes you stronger when you're out fighting, and you have to go out fighting to get resources and story progress to make it easier to grow your rice. And both halves feel like they've gotten a lot of polish (though the combat isn't quite as deep as the rice growing, though that isn't that much of a slight given how crazy deep the rice growing is).

Moment to moment, when you're growing rice, there's a lot to keep track of and it's all about making small adjustments and remembering and sticking to a long term plan. There's enough details to adjust and details that are mostly out of your control that there's always something to improve. When you're out fighting, the combat feels good, trying to maintain a combo, smash enemies into each other, get out of the way of the big attacks, etc. There's also a bit of exploring the levels looking for rare materials and equipment.

The experience of the game is a back and forth between needing to deal with the urgent needs of your rice, the ticking clock of daylight, and wanting to get further into the levels to progress. The year-long cycle of growing the rice forces you to plan well ahead, and you learn how to best grow it in bits and pieces, which both serves to not overwhelm you and to keep you interested. The story also does a good job keeping you moving forward between years.

Should you buy this game for the aesthetics? The game and characters are cute and enjoyable to hang out with. All of the art is well made, though there's a few hiccups in the animations. Overall I wouldn't say the aesthetics alone are impressive enough to sell the game. They're not hurting it either though.

Should you buy the game for the story? Maybe. It's well enough written and localized, and the setting and characters are interesting. While the major story beats may be a little predictable, that's not such a bad thing. It does a good job of keeping you interested throughout the game's runtime. And there are a few surprises along the way.

Should you buy this for the gameplay? Definitely. This is both one of the best examples of how to mash two genres together as well as one of the deepest farming sims I've played. Unless you just hate beat-em-ups or farming sim games, it's definitely worth playing.

Would you enjoy this game? This is a good combination of Dark Souls, Bloodborne and Sekiro, plus an interesting story with interesting characters. If you enjoyed any of those, you'll likely enjoy Lies of P as well. Even if you didn't, it's not quite as difficult as any of those (still not easy though), so you might still enjoy it.

Moment to moment play: Other than the occasional moment of making a choice of what to say, or picking out your loadout, you'll be spending most of the game fighting a variety of enemies. Combat focusses pretty heavily on blocking or parrying and then retaliating. Blocking still hurts but then gives you a chance to recover if you can hit the enemy in time, so it really encourages you to be aggressive. Some enemies really reward getting your timing down though as a perfect block gives you so many benefits. (There is a dodge, but it doesn't feel nearly as useful as in Dark Souls.)

Gameplay experience: The game is pretty much running from one fight to the next, stopping every now and then to talk to someone or turn in a quest. There's very little backtracking (the map loops back through the hotel regularly, but there's not often a reason to revisit anywhere else), or exploration (you need to figure out how to navigate through some of the buildings, but there's never a side path that's all that long with only one or two exceptions). The story is compelling though, and you want to beat that next boss to see what else is going to happen, and the bosses themselves are interesting to fight.

Should you buy this for the story? Maybe not just for the story. It's certainly interesting, and fairly well told, but I don't know if I'd struggle through the game to see the story if you didn't enjoy the combat. But if you do enjoy the combat, the story certainly keeps you interested.

Should you buy this for the aesthetics? The graphics aren't quite as polished as it perhaps could be, but there's certainly nothing wrong with it. The voice actors give good performances. The character designs are interesting, appealing, or disturbing as appropriate. The world they created is intriguing. All that said, again, I wouldn't buy the game just to hang out in this world unless you also enjoy the combat.

Should you buy this game for the gameplay? Yes, if you enjoy tense, souls-like melee combat. I don't know that this would convert all that many people into souls-like fans, but it might let a few people on the fence enjoy a full-blown souls-like game. Overall the combat felt a little less punishing than Dark Souls or Sekiro, despite how much it draws from those games. (Perhaps healing and blocking are a bit more common, or the enemies do a little less damage, or maybe I just lucked into a really effective build.) But I do think it's worth your money if none of that scares you off.