It might be extremely derivative but at least it chose great games to learn from. It plays almost identically to a Mega Man Zero/ZX game, and you can't go a level or boss without seeing a reference to an Inti Creates or Capcom game, but I'd be lying if I said it bothered me much. Level design was pretty strong; it consistently felt pretty purposeful and I hardly ever found myself just going through the motions. Your toolkit is fun to mess around with too, between the versatile EX skills and the powerful ultimate skills you get from bosses. Speaking of the bosses, they're great to fight too. Even the music is decent and the visuals are nice and easy on the eyes, as opposed to the likes of Gravity Circuit. But despite taking so many pages from MMZ, I really wish they took the "the saber is the best weapon in the game" page. It hits like a wet noodle and doesn't feel nearly as good to use. I found myself using the buster way more than I'd like.

Regardless, it's a great, and surprisingly polished game. Perhaps if Inti Creates-inspired games were a dime a dozen like roguelites and metroidvanias and boomer shooters, I'd be more critical of how unoriginal it is. But that's just not the current indie game climate, so I can't help but feel appreciation more than anything else.