Fun mechanics, great style, and a bit of janky physics, but that's to be expected for an ambitious souls-like experience from a fresh indie team. Credit where credit is due, though, they put passion and care into the designs of the environments and characters. That said, the environments can seem somewhat barren and sometimes have buggy collisions. The enemies are fine for the most part, and the bosses are hit or miss. I just wish I didn't fight 3 of them in a row. Another Crab's Treasure was my first souls-like experience and I'm glad to have played it as my first.

My first Metroidvania, and what a Metroidvania it was! I loved the breathtaking visuals that Team Cherry put so much effort into. 2D hand-drawn visuals in a game of this caliber are jaw-dropping. Every enemy felt natural to their environments and very well designed.

The mechanics were straightforward to grasp as there wasn't really much to learn, but they made platforming a fun aspect of exploring the game! I never felt that there should've been more added to the moveset of the Knight.

The gameplay as a whole is a blast up until two-thirds of the way through, where it feels more like a chore, and not an adventure. You may have to do a few menial tasks to receive something, but the rewards are not horrible in value. It's just that getting there will take a bunch of repetition and practice. No, it does not ruin the experience as a whole, but I wanted to mention the moments that stood out most to me, and this is one of those occasional moments. Sometimes, it did feel frustrating trying to find where a specific ability was so I could access multiple areas and progress further. Maybe I could have disregarded hints and clues about finding these key items and I will own up to that. Though there were many important items that I found based on happenstance, and I don't really know if that's done intentionally, but I personally prefer a little direction.

The story felt hard to understand at times, and to be honest, I wasn't focusing on it for most of my session. At face value I understood the main issues, exposition, and connection in the most shallow form. I liked the story it set out to portray of the ancient kingdom of Hallownest and the infection that decimated the civilization. I just wish there was more. I would've loved to see more animated cutscenes for longer periods of time, but working on the time constraints and small team they had, I totally get it.

This game was just a mindless exploration that I loved going through. Everything felt right, the visuals, soundtrack, enemies… Everything. There were very few times that I felt bored to get off after long sessions, granted, it felt tedious at times. I'm sure this is a nitpick that others have had before, but I hope silksong has a fast travel system for the benches (if that's what they use as a checkpoint system). I get that the tram and stag are there to make it easier to get from area to area, but I would've preferred fast travel points being the benches. I'm just lazy and like going back in areas to find some things I may have missed quickly. The dreamgate is helpful but not in the way that I would normally use.

All in all, this was a fun time and I can't wait for the next Team Cherry game!