head to head
vs
Little Nightmares IIvsShovel Knight
Little Nightmares II leans Execution (Practiced Mastery); Shovel Knight leans Execution (Practiced Mastery).
Little Nightmares IIShovel Knight
Axis by axis
Execution5 vs 6
Shovel Knight leans harder on execution: Pogo combat and platforming need timing
Reads0 vs 1
Shovel Knight leans harder on reads: Scripted boss patterns, not reads
Variance1 vs 1
Even - both lean on variance about the same.
Optimization4 vs 4
Even - both lean on optimization about the same.
Two games can score the same on an axis and still test it in very different ways - read each rationale, not just the number.