the first area kind of reminds me of like. a medieval backrooms. i kinda wonder how it would have felt if you went for that backrooms vibe with that kind of bizarre architecture.
i was a bit thrown off by that first area as well, though. the fact that you can actually just fall down to the boss on accident and die instantly is a bit silly, and the sword isn't that easy to find either considering you have to be constantly ganked by flying enemies before you can actually grab it.
the combat serves its purpose, but considering how much stamina the slash attack takes to use, i was expecting something a bit flashier and cooler! the first boss is sort of funny because like, they start out with an aerial attack that can slash away half your health if it hits, but it never gets used again in the fight and sort of feels more like a tutorial for you (the player) to use aerial slashes to take them down more easily.
some kind of regeneration on attacking enemies would also have helped smooth things out a bit. also, the dialogue system is bugged; once you start a dialogue scene with one of the purple totems, you're unable to back out of it, and have to go back to main menu and reload.
one last thing: pressing new game while having a save file just wipes your save file :( i would have liked some sort of confirmation prompt, especially because the two buttons are very near each other!!!