Been playing Difficult Game About Climbing since Im a big fan of Getting Over It. The game is very good and if you're a fan of GOI or other physics based platformers like Umihara Kawase you should definitely give it a shot.
While I'm having a good time, I can't say I'm liking it nearly as much as Getting Over It. For a while I couldn't quite put my finger on why because on paper it should be just as good if not better - it's more challenging, having essentially 2 independent grappling hooks (or arms as some call it) is interesting and can lead to some very fun dynamics since you can swing and launch yourself in all kinds of crazy ways, and the grip system is a good way of capturing GOI's slope interactions in a different kind of 2D climbing game, one which can't simulate the bumpy rocky curvy terrain of a cliff. And yet despite all that, the game doesn't really feel as exciting to play. After playing both back-to-back I think I realized why - momentum & fluidity.
GOI is challenging and deep but the better you get, the more you can build upward momentum and the better you can sustain it - challenges which would take you minutes of slow deliberate climbing can be cleared with one or two uninterrupted jumps, you get into a real groove chaining together hammer swings and pushes, almost like building up a nice fat multiplier. In contrast, Climbing Game is much more manual and reset heavy, instead of doing more with less swings as you understand the mechanics, you instead do the same amounts of grabs and swings but much faster. You can build lateral speed quickly by swinging, but upward speed is limited to just pulling yourself directly up and is interrupted by the next grab or set of grabs - you are always fighting gravity at each step instead of making it work for you.
It feels like theres a bit of mismatch even, because IMO (& based off my experience so far) the horizontal movement is both more interesting and more fun due to the momentum factor, and yet the game is based around climbing up.
So this is something I will try to pay attention to in physics based games cause it does seem important - not just the challenge & depth but how these games reward you with momentum, how much you can make the gravity work for you instead of just struggling against it.
Warning : I'm still learning Difficult Game About Climbing so maybe as I get better my views will change and I'll get a taste for the more restricted momentum building. Who knows.