MAIDEN: LESS
yeah this is a 10/10 no notes from me bud, favourite game of the jam so far.
Finally got around to playing this one, and what a treat. Everything is so tight - one of the best tutorials I've seen in a jam game, the slow unravelling of the anime edgelord plot, the writing (!), the dead-simple controls, the little screw from your charge attack having a hitbox, the subtle health regen that's enough to prevent some unnecessary restarts but not enough to trivialize fights (I thought it would, then I got hit three or four times right as I was about to finish off 'Nam Guy and exploded), each boss having its own gimmick that slowly escalates in difficulty until the final boss...
This is also one of the few games I've played so far that really takes a genuine shot at being serious. A lot of games have either not touched that part of the theme or just did some lampshading in the title or something, but this game goes all-in on the adolescent weeaboo angle - it's not serious to us on the outside, but every child, teenager, and unstable veteran taking it so seriously is so charming.