Despite briefly dabbling with forum darlings du jour Monster Hunter World and Dead Cells, I keep being drawn back to this. Went through Way of the Demon pretty quickly, doing the dozen or so missions where I had missed a Kodama, and then rounding it out with some short sub-missions. Everything goes way faster when just running from fight to fight on the direct path to the boss (and rarely dying to boot), rather than poking around every nook and cranny.
Still rocking the Dragon Ninja / Hayabusa-style Kusarigama set, though I found an accessory that reduces set requirements, so I ditched the Dragon Sword for some other random set piece that gives a useful 2-piece passive. I did spring for one big reforging of the kusarigama from 150+9 up to 178+10, but otherwise have mostly ignored gear. I’m finding stuff around level 215 now, but my damage is still holding up fine. Figure at some point it will really fall off, and then it’ll be time to respec and try some other weapon entirely.