Ask for the shape of the challenge.

Badges let you paper over whichever skill you lack. The special world at the end is the only place it stops being polite about that.

The main path is generous and the last stretch of Moons is not — the hard version of this game is entirely opt-in and clearly signposted.

Generous by design and confident enough not to pretend otherwise. The optional speedrun levels at the end are the only place it bares its teeth.

Story missions checkpoint constantly and aim assist does most of the shooting. The spikes are the driving and the gold medal objectives, which nobody is obliged to take.

Gentle to look at and quietly ruthless to score — the tile you place carelessly on turn ten is the one that ends the run four hundred turns later.

The difficulty is purely attentional — nothing in the game threatens you except the square inch of grime you keep walking past.

Crushing is the only setting where the shooting bites. Everything else is a set piece that restarts you a few seconds before it went wrong.

Combat that yields immediately to a difficulty slider, wrapped around a preparation system the game quietly assumes you will ignore.