So after having just beat the game, I overall like it, but it has some big flaws that really present themselves on the 'MAster of Samurai' difficulty. I'm annoyed to say that I was able to beat all of the levels on the difficulty on it except for Aku City and the Final level, where I had to drop the difficulty on the respective bosses of each to win.
To give a tldr at the beginning, based on a hard-mode run, I'd give it a 7/10 at the lowest. It's a great, if short, game that is nice fanservice for the series and plays fairly well. It's no titan or anything, but the gameplay is very competent for what it is. There are enough flaws in the system, however, that, unless you're looking for a head-to-wall-banging challenge, I would not recommend doing Hard mode on the first run. It's certainly possible (as I said, I only felt to drop it on 2 separate occasions and this was on the Bosses of their stage), but you will most likely die often and it won't always feel like it's your fault and definitely extends the playtime (10 hours is what they suggest, I got it in 17).
I'd recommend the Fists over the sword for your 'permanent' weapons (Jumping Strong is faster and has better tracking to help with small enemies) and for the breakables, the Hammer is the best of the bunch; it has a significant amount of hyperarmor and the ability to get Aggressive defense options that straightup block damage while attacking instead of just armoring through them as well.
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As has been mentioned in the thread, while the game is very good, you can definitely feel the budget and it's most apparent on the higher difficulty as the flaws with the battle systems (primarily, I feel, hit detection) are most apparent here. Word of advice no matter the difficulty: LEARN THE PARRY and USE THE BLOCK! The enemies often have extended hitboxes on their attacks, especially the glowing red attacks that you can't block. Enemies will also get into a defensive stance quite often seemingly just because. This is important to know because, with these 2 combinations of factors, the enemy can often retaliate very fast (too fast sometimes) while you're mid combo and catch you off guard, dealing massive damage on hard.
The worst part, though, is the mobbing that the enemies do. They're absolutely brutal at times and Jack does not get sufficient i-frames from getting hit so most of the time, if you screw up and start to get juggled, the enemies will just pummel you, so it's super important that you work on not getting hit in the first place. Unless you get the proper times to block down, be prepared to get ganked and wombo-comboed quite often.
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As an aside, I think the Steam Achievements are bugged, cause I don't have any, lol
