Ask for the shape of the challenge.

Every individual mechanic is trivial; the difficulty is entirely another human being who cannot hear what you are shouting.

Two players, one screen, no difficulty setting. The hard part is coordination, and the game restarts you both a second after it goes wrong.

Combat is scored on the beat and will still let you win off it. Playing to the rhythm is the difference between a rank and a mess.

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.

A blockbuster that expects to be finished, with the actual demands parked in optional bosses you can walk past without the story noticing.

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.

Swinging is forgiving by design. The spikes are the crowded arena fights on Ultimate, where one unblocked rifle burst is most of a health bar.

Beautiful and forgiving right up to the escape sequences, which convert a gentle metroidvania into a memorisation test with no warning at all.

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.

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