Everything together makes for one of the most fun games I've played this year and an easy recommendation to any platforming fanatic.
Closing Thoughts: While Magical Delicacy can deliver cozy vibes, it drops the magic ball on almost everything else. The platforming isn't fun, cooking doesn't feel satisfying, and the main gameplay loop boils down to doing fetch quests for NPCs just to get a few extra bits of story and a generic upgrade. Both the cooking and platforming sides work against each other, and everything lacks polish, especially the animations. It's a fundamentally flawed experience with a clashing visual identity, with a great soundtrack and pleasant story being the main saving graces.
It won't blow your socks off, but Mind Over Magnet will at least loosen your legwear with its incredible understanding of game design fundementals, a magnet gimmick that feels fresh, solid visuals that serve the gameplay perfectly, and music that I could listen to for hours. It won't last you too long, and it doesn't try to do anything super out of the ordinary, but it's a short and sweet game that hits a home run for every ball it's batting at.
Rivals of Aether II gives fans of the genre a lot to love, with the promise of even more on the way, and the game is constantly getting patches and improving. If it offered a proper story mode and slightly more intuitive mechanics on top of cleaning up the skins for clarity's sake, it would be up there with the best fighting games ever. It feels incredible to play, the music is awesome, and the visuals are some of the most unique in the industry without feeling like they're compromising for frame rate. If you're a fan of Smash Bros. gameplay, you owe it to yourself to give Rivals of Aether II a shot, but you should know that it's still a work in progress, even after release.