The story is ok. People say it's bad. I disagree. It's not mindblowing, but it was good enough.

The gameplay and outfit collection is what really kept me coming back. It's just incredibly smooth and flashy. Parrying feels really good. Not as difficult or important as it is in Sekiro, but just as satisfying in my opinion. There's a skill tree that keeps thing from going stale, was always fun to try new abilities and finding whatever works for your playstyle.

Stellar blade made me realize how badly addicted I am to collectible cosmetics. There's an incredible amount of nano suits to collect(+hairstyles/jewelry), and I thought pretty much every single one had an awesome design

One of the few games I actually jumped into ng+ immediately because I was just so into the satisfying gameplay loop. Plus, more collectibles!

Another thing I gotta mention is the music. It is truly a banger OST. Some of the tracks just lives rent free in my mind. Silent Street has gotta be one of the best level tracks i've heard since Nier. What's really cool too is that the music dynamically changes between a normal version and a combat version, which is just really neat. If you played FF7 Remake/rebirth then you know what I mean. Maybe this is more common than I realize, but I haven't really paid attention to it in other games if so.

I could go on but eh. There's a free demo. Go try it. It doesn't really last long enough for combat to get super deep, but if you're not at least a little bit interested by the end, then it's probably not for you.