Played a lot of the game this game this week (yeah, kinda stupid to play early access right before the release, but it's all so I can do the funbuilding once I'll learn of release changes) and found it to be more or less enjoyable but, at the same time, extremely mediocre.
First and foremost, in terms of gameplay it feels exactly like an RPGmaker game. Minus the faux-console interface. And the simple graphics. And the specific story developments (because yeah, most of such games try to present THE STORY). Apart from that, it's has pretty much nothing that strongly differentiates it from a myriad other such games. Now, that'll sound like a heresy, but I don't mind the RPGmaker games at all. I used to like them, actually (no rpgmakercodex, unfortunately). Their only problem is the sheer volume of them and the lack of reliable sources to help you in finding the actually good stuff. That's why I don't bother with them anymore. And, well, the limitations of the engine - despite people trying hard to make their combat unique (at least in the better exemplars), most of them fail at that department. So they can provide a good experience but it's gonna be a limited one. And, of course, they have their problems which stem directly from their golden JRPG-era predecessors. And all that is present in the Xulima. Despite it being neither an JRPG or an RPGmaker game.
From that viewpoint, the biggest issue is the combat. No, it's fine, it's just not fresh and holds nothing surprising at all. Some of the enemies (like thieves, for example) are so painfully carbon-copied that it's not even funny. I dunno even from where, I just know they are cliche. And the tactics and the flow of the combat are extremely generic - the classes play like everywhere else, so yeah, the cleric's mass heals are vital for the party's survival, the mage is a main DPS dealer with his AoE nukes, the fighter has some charged attacks and, in prolonged combat, poison (or burn or bleeding which are the same mechanic, pretty much) is the king. Been there, done that. If anything, the game's combat system is even simplistic - skill points are rather precious so your spell arsenal turns out to be smaller than in your average RPGmaker game. Of course, they lack balance so you usually use just a handful of skills, but it's not like here it's different. What is different here, lol?
Once again, I'm not saying the game is shit. It's ok and, probably, people who've never seen RPGmaker or JRPG stuff will enjoy it a lot as it'll be their first contact with these sorts of gameplay. But for someone who knows this, it's absolutely banal and not that interesting. Yeah, in the beginning of the game where it still feels fresh (mind you, I haven't played RPGmakers in, like, 3 years or so so I'm feeling this way after a long break) and the combat is somewhat difficult, it's sorta nice. But that ends quickly (more so if you take on a harder challenges and do a couple of things that you're not supposed to do - for example, slaughter all of elite guards of the first prince and you gain so much experience that it breaks the early-to-mid game, pretty much). And only grind remains (and boy, they say this game is 100 hours, but most of that is exactly this - fighting another trashmob encounter). Well, I dunno, maybe you're not forced to grind this much if you don't finish each area (I did it mostly to test stuff with the game), but on the highest difficulty you're absolutely forced to and, you see, each area has a couple of really tough (and thus interesting) encounters. But to have them, you have to actually finish most of those trashmob fights so yeah. Tthere are very few standing monsters, btw - most attack you in the ambushes, though there's a limited amount of ambushes for each area; another thing is that the amount of ambushes is certainly overbloated - a small lake area that'll take 5 minutes to explore will have 15 ambushes and, roughly, it's 1 ambush per minute. Anyhow, to put in a shorter way, combat starts nice, but gets stale rather soon, unfortunately.
And, apart from the combat, I can't say that the game boasts that much. Yeah, there's exploration, but it's somewhat limited by what you can (and can not) kill. The game is supposedly open-worlded, but there's a clear course that the authors try to set you upon. In some places, it can be broken through (even if fights are difficult), in other, you have to wait until certain moments of the game. And, apart from the combat, there's not much to find in the game so meh.
The story is extremely plain. It's epic and played absolutely straight, without any kind of twists (well, apart from the totally apparent one at the end - I haven't finished it, but it glares quite obviously) or any interesting stuff happening. You're hero, you're saving villagers and shit. And main character is pre-made and looks like Conchita Wurst. And is so boring that I've skipped most of the dialogues (the one with the first prince was atrocious, though).
The graphics are also generic. Like, the backgrounds are really pretty, but the design of it all is absolutely generic. No attempts to do anything original are made. Which, to be honest, seems to be the name of the game. I don't want to say the game is bad and I'm not sorry about the time I've spent on it (though, now that I've understood its system, I really don't want to finish it or play anything past that), but I'm finding zero remarkable things about it. Everything is plain / simple / generic / have been somewhere else already. So what's the point, really?
At least the character system is ok. Well, the stats system is bad (it's always strength+speed for the fighters, speed+constitution+energy for the mages), but the skills offer some choices and the only bad class is the arcane soldier. And even he has some uses. So you can certainly build a number of parties in this game. Now, why would anyone want to replay it is a different matter.