I'm shelving this for now because, from the 5 hours I played, nothing seems to have changed from the game's previous version besides less clunky combat. Not to say the previous game was bad in any way - in fact, I love it very much - but I'm not at a place right now where I feel the need to return to it.
I'll likely come back to this at some point when I feel the urge to play through the first game again.