This is currently on gamepass and I downloaded it on a whim (i'm a sucker for a metroidvania) and it's turning out to be a lot of fun.

You traverse the world, complete with minimap that fills in as you discover new areas. While you're in the world, you have a pet companion that can access hidden areas via flight, corresponding orbs, or slashing walls.

On top of that is the turn based combat with your monster battling other monsters, which you collect after you defeat them. Each monster has their own multi level tree you can dump points into as seen below for just 1 monster:

(credit: https://monster-sanctuary.fandom.com/wiki/Aurumtail)

So far the story has been pretty blah - there's something cool there about a character that is not a master at his job which is interesting, but overall meh. Also there are random battles in the world which occur about every 3-4 screens and can get kind of annoying since the fast track system isn't the best. But that's really it, otherwise i'm loving this game!

Reaaaalllllllyyyyyyy? I shall give it a go thanks duder!

Its on my to play list. Gotta use that Xbox Series X for some indies ^^

I liked it until I didn't. Mid game feels like a real grind and monster experience is spread out kind of poorly. I finished the second area and suddenly the enemies there were like 2-3 levels lower and the ones in the next area were like 5 levels higher. Game needs to be balanced better unless they just intend you to grind.

@royalghost: That's interesting, because I'm not sure how/if the game intends you to play a certain way, but I travelled west and actually ran into a Duel that I was like 2-3 levels lower and was getting destroyed. I moved on to another area, circled back and it was fine. I think if you are hitting every random battle, yeah you'll probably be over matched for the areas.

For me, the traversal has been my least favorite, even with the shards that return you back to the main hub. Wish there was either more checkpoints per area or you could teleport from your location, to the hub, then back to your location. Oh well.

@octavis: Nah I was playing it more like a metroidvania than anything. I went into the ice area a bit early even and kind of just powered through. There's not really anywhere else I can go and I have every monster in those first few areas. Like every time I got a new ability I was revisiting places. It was when I had nothing else to do that I was like well guess I'm going to the next area. That or grind out the Champions that were suddenly like level 15 while I was level 11.