I don't know if anyone else feels this way about the game, but despite having unlocked a LOT of things in it (dare I say most, I even reached the dragon guy, still didn't beat him), I feel like the combat system is detracting from my experience. The game itself is fairly grindy when it comes to materials, but I understand that a lot of people love to grind for stuff, so I see that as mostly fine (though some item drops could use some number increases). But my main issue is how the combat feels like it throws a lot of disadvantages on the player and makes many fights unnecessarily difficult.

Think about it, in your favor you have:

- Knowledge of the moves the enemy is weak to once you beat them with those (or use the guide)

- Consumable items

Against you, however, you have:

- Your damage cannot hit through multiple phases, while the enemies' can, sometimes going as far as jumping an entire phase if the damage is high enough

- You spend your own health to use attacks, while enemies' health is untouched when they use their own.

- You need to time your buttons to get your attacks to hit, while the enemy will NEVER miss their attacks

- You need to level up and grind to acquire all moves, and many fights straight up cannot be won if you don't always use the "supereffective" moves on the enemy

- You also need to grind to get the consumable items that are one of your advantages, as well as good enough equipment to reach a point in which you can, struggling, beat the stronger enemies

Its just way too much stuff going against you in these fights. Why does your healthbar even have phases if the enemies always ignore them? Why don't they miss their attacks if you have good enough equipment, for example? I enjoy this game's concept greatly and even the art style, which wasn't one of my favourites, grew on me, because its not bad at all. I loved following through the silly story and banging all guys in it, but the combat is just making things really infuriating. I can try to go through the dragon again, but even if I win, it will be because I played to absolute perfection and had a bunch of expensive consumables with me. This shouldn't be so hard, we have Badass mode for that, its legitimately stopping me from enjoying what would otherwise be an amazing game.

Before I add my opinion: You need to use cooking consumables, otherw hise you can't win vs  him (Use the kitchen of the Guy with the Spear in the Village).

I 100% agree with you, that there are many layers within the game that make it rather unenjoyable. These mechanics you described which are part of the battlesystem are not challening, but more so  roadblocks that just extend the hours you put into the game. I mean I knew I had to fight 25 Cursed Knights to gain Black Balls in order to get armor to defeat the dragon (for example). I know what I have to click, what will happen, I know the difficulty I have to go through in order to get there. There are no possible ways to shorten the timefrime by using my wits.  So it's no longer a challenge, but rather a question of how long it will take. I had that frustration over many parts during this game. I think a challenge within a game should not be defined by the parameter of my ability to endure repeatitive gameplay and as a result the resulting boredom coming out of it.  Which is also another reason why I think this game is definitely overpriced for what it offers.