This was a blast to play through - every part of the control felt right. I hated having to hold down Up to launch the subweapon in SotN, so having its own dedicated buttons was nice.
It was confusing to figure out which button did what, though - every symbol looked foreign and non-descriptive compared to other games. Once I figured that out, everything was really fun to control. I only had trouble with the swinging things, and the D-pad in general - I was playing on a tablet, too! It was a joy to control the character since dodging didn't make you go faster than normal running, and jumping felt SO perfect.
One of the Play Store's taglines were about dying a lot, so it's nice to see the 5 times my character died was because of me not doing good enough, rather than a result of terrible controls. I do have to say though that 1) why is the bonus boss far easier than the story boss and 2) the story boss' dash attack is too tall, I once died even though my character's feet was 2 entire inches above her head. Also, her first phase's fireballs are MUCH MUCH HARDER to dodge due to them ranging between really slow and fast (the second phase was fast - very fast, easier to dodge). But atleast the boss made sounds upon being hit so I wasn't really mad.
The game's artstyle is superb and it's clear the artist spent a lot of time practicing the Castlevania artstyle - I approve. The character looks just as great as Shanoa, if not better due to her vibrant color choices. Surprisingly, she never blended in the background despite a lot of the game having red hues, too.
I was a little disappointed to to find no secret areas you whack with your whip, though.
Overall, I loved the hour I spent playing the game. I like the idea of no EXP levels too, especially if it's balanced out by buying stuff later when the game has a shop system (so you can only buy a limited number of potions). It still gives a sense of progression without the extremeities that roguelite genre does. Thank you for making this.
4/5 stars though because you didn't thank the player for playing the game. MWAHAHAHAHA