My first Shantae game and I'd say it's all style, no substance
The game looks great. The art style is gorgeous and there's plenty of fanservice (every single female character has big boobs and shows off some skin),The gameplay though is very meh.
The enemy combat isn't particularly interesting. You're just whipping people with your hair all day like Kabuki: Quantum Fighter. I got a gun as a secondary weapon, but it's weak as hell. The combat is kind of cheap at times, like those obnoxious jumping frogs early in the game that randomly jump around the environment and can shoot projectiles at you from off screen just as you're in the middle of a jump. Or enemies just randomly materializing above you in some places (stupid bat creatures and snakes). Then there's the annoying rooms where you're locked in and have to fight two powerful enemies at once. None of this matters though, since the game hands you so many damn health items that you can't actually die. The sole exception to this is certain areas that inexplicably become one hit kill zones where Shantae dies with the exploding Mega Man animation for some strange reason. Oh wait, that's right...it's a reference. You know how pandering game studios love to shove pointless references into their games
![Rolling Eyes :roll:](./images/smilies/icon_rolleyes.gif)
The writing is clever and funny at times, but just stupid at other times.
The boss fights are pretty good, but it's not enough to make me want to keep playing.