After playing through the available content, I can confidently say I'd recommend this game (the 10 dollar price tag and early access disclaimer makes it that much more palatable). There are things I like and things I dislike, so I'll try to go on a point-by-point basis.
Graphics - Holy moly, are the graphics quality! This might be me typically playing games with more cartoonish/stylized looks (Slay the Spire 2 and Deep Rock Galactic, for example), but the textures and lighting were excellent! Now, I will mention that I set everything to Low, given my potato of a computer, so I don't know how its supposed to look (i.e. High or Ultra), but Low looks better than some of the best retextures for a certain Bethesda title. That said, even on low, there were times where my frames hiccupped, such as when rounding a corner too fast, but again... potato PC.
Lore and Worldbuilding - Yes. I want more. I'm a sucker for worldbuilding in general, and the environmental story telling of the game thus far is fascinating. There's only one "Level" to sift through right now (bear in mind that level took me three hours to complete), but I'm already interested in seeing how this story unfolds more. It does get a little confusing, but I'm chalking that up to there only being a few hours of gameplay present for now.
Mechanics - There's not much to talk about mechanic wise, since the thing I really wanted to try out, the crafting, isn't in game yet. There is, however, alchemy, with an alchemy pot near the start of every level. There's lots of consumable herbs, mushrooms, and other ingredients to use, with different effects depending on if you make a potion (you consume) or a coating (bonus effect on your weapon for a time). I have one issue with the alchemy system, and its not a big deal but one most other games explain: THERE'S NO RECIPES. To clarify, while most games have hard set recipes or require items to share effects to make potions, this one has no such limits. There are two recipes that make throwable bombs (which were underwhelming in my opinion... seriously, I beaned a guy in the face with a shrapnel bomb and he didn't even flinch), but other than that you can just throw three random consumables into the pot and make whatever you want. I did not figure this out until AFTER THE FIRST BOSS, when I said "Screw it... lets throw these healing herbs into the pot and see what's what." and threw aside my fear of losing ingredients a la Skyrim alchemy. Also, you can use three of the same item to make a potion, i.e. three of the same mushroom or rock works as well as three different ingredients.
Enemy Variety - The enemy variety is limited, which makes sense for how little there is in game right now. Guy with sword, guy with axe, and guy with spear are the standard fair, with rock throwers and archers mixed in to make you run for cover. There are some stronger variants, like poison bombers and shieldbearers, that take more time to handle, but they aren't the worst unless you get caught offguard. Then there's the bosses... there are two that I really noticed, one in each of the last two zones. I'll say it plain: the second to last boss was MUCH harder than the final boss. Like, damn... I got all hyped up for the final encounter after the first of the two, then ripped the last one in half without hardly drinking a potion.
Combat - A game like Fatekeeper is going to live and die by its combat system. It advertises using the environment to the player's advantage, and it doesn't fail in that regard. There have been many times where I blasted some mook into a spike wall and went "Huh... that was there... neat!", and many more times I've seen the hazards I could've dropped on their head well after I bashed it in by hand. I have a habit of running in guns blazing, so that's on me. I messed about with the spells a bit, and I can see their usefulness, but I was focused on pure melee so my spells were sparks at best. Speaking of melee...
My Biggest Issue - Cripes, melee feels clunky! There are three options for melee weapon types: daggers, axes, and greatswords. From the first to the last, they fall on a spectrum of speed vs power, with daggers beeing "death by a thousand cuts" and greatswords packing a wallop, with axes soundly in the middle. However, regardless of which weapon I was trying out, there were several issues that I could feel immediately. The kick, which seems to have been advertised everywhere, has some real power to it, but the wind up is painful. Like, from a standing position it makes sense, but if you kick mid sprint you come to a full stop and then kick. Something that's probably more of a skill issue on my end is light attacks using stamina. You can throw out so many attacks so fast that you don't realized its all gone until you go to swing and stumble like a fool. The chief offender is, frankly, the keybinds: light attack on left mouse, heavy attack on right mouse, block on R key... I rebound block to right mouse and completely forgot heavy attacks existed by the end. I rarely used heavy attacks anyway, since the wind up is sluggish, the recovery is worse, and getting hit by a stiff breeze effectively stuns you longer that the entire animation combined, and I think every heavy I threw at either boss was canceled by a surprise backhand anyway. The best tactic ended up being using an axe to wail on fools to keep them staggered (unless they seemed to choose to not be staggered, but I digress) and bring out my inner Souls player (never touched a soulslike before, btw) and dodge attacks like my adult responsibilities (I don't win that battle, either). With the shear volume of guys thrown at you at once, that was the best way to handle the melee guys before bull rushing the ranged ones. I know some people have complained about the ranged enemies, since you can't block their attacks, the dodge timing is weird, there's never just one, and they're always somewhere inconvenient, but honestly... a boot to the head fixed that issue quickly. I also play like an ape (see "habit of running in guns blazing" above) so I usually just bull rush ranged boys in any game.
Overall - From the perspective of worldbuilding, most of it is told through the environment and little blurbs spoken at the beginning of areas, so if you just rush through on the war path you'll miss a lot of it. However, with how beautiful the scenery is, it's almost impossible to pass through the world without stopping to take in the view. As far as crafting goes, I wish the way alchemy works was better explained so I didn't need to waste sooo much time munching raw mushrooms. The enemies are fairly standard, tougher variants add a bit of spice, but the bosses (again, I only noticed two, maybe the others were just fancy reskins of dudes that got lost in the melee mash) feel wildly imbalanced for the order you face them in. Combat wise, I can't speak too much on spells as I didn't use them often, but the mainstay melee system is painful compared to those of other games. Light attacks feel fine, blocking could be a bit faster, the kick is funky but funny, all that's fine... but the heavy attack may as well not be bound to anything by default. The best time to use it is when the enemy gets knocked down or staggered, but you can attack two or three times with light attacks in the time it takes for one heavy. I love playing the heavy armor, heavy weapon juggernaut, but between the penalties of heavy attacks and the number of mobs to fight at once I may as well have been playing drunk and blind. Again, I recommend this game, even though my favorite playstyle feels really weak, because I think it has the framework for greatness. Maybe more weapon and armor types, new spells with customizable options (i.e. pick four from X to bring), some fine tuning combat and new enemy variants, that stuff. I can see the vision... its a helluva ways off, but the first impression is strong!
