Thank you for your comment!
The game will not include the possibility to change difficulties, but overall the difficulty will be reduced, while extra Bosses will be more challenging than the usual.
Free-roaming is not included in the game due to the way it is structured, but there are certain areas that can be accessed for some exploration (talking to Irys)
i'll give it another shot when the game is out before i give my honest review, cause the game is good just would love to enjoy the story more but the gameplay is super tedious and the annoyance of enemy encounters does ruin the fun of exploration, other than that the story is quite good and art style is beautiful