Definitely another personal top spot contender for me! A perfectly sized game with no real weak points as far as I could tell.
I absolutely loved the story, cutscenes and music. The characters and environments were gorgeous, and the atmosphere in general was one of the strongest aspects of the game for me. I think the visuals did a great job conveying a sense of bleakness and the post-apocalypse even while maintaining a cutesy and playful art style.
Both combat and movement felt responsive and snappy, although I found myself too busy spamming the default attack to think about using the homing shot much. The array of upgrades was pretty impressive, and I really enjoyed the little bits of lore behind each item. The changing appearance of the character with each upgrade was also a great touch!
I think if I had a single minor complaint, it's that there wasn't any one upgrade that really made me go "wow," being fairly standard Metroidvania fare for the most part. Of course, a basic powerup that's well implemented is much better than a unique but janky one! Though considering the obvious level of quality and effort in everything else, I think the game could definitely have afforded to take a bit more of a risk there.
The boss at the end was brutal at first and took a good few attempts, but I finally managed to take it down and enjoy the ambiguous ending. Overall, a very well-scoped and well-executed little adventure with nothing really bad to say about it!