First off let me thank you for playing!
I have updated the menu and player dead zones on the analog thank you!
The dodge only being 8 directions is not at all hard to implement and will have it done for next demo day (maybe I'll make it toggable so players can really feel both styles)
The strawmen actually do die when their health is depleted but I may need to better show that because the health bar did look empty but he actually did have health. When the game bugged out he actually died from losing all his health.
When executing enemies the player runs into animation position like you said in this case the player rips the straw out of the strawman's chest so he needs to run to the front.
Combo meter was actually bugged out but has since been patched.
The player is slow in attack speed and dodge for a reason right now. You are actually level 0 and souls will be used to buy stats later.
I agree that context sensitive executions would be neat but I think it is too much work...I do plan to maybe add environmental context sensitive executions but I'm still much too early in to fully decide.
A lot of the slow sluggish feel comes from wanting to make a "weighted" top down dark souls clone. Specifically I want the game to punish players for attacking when they shouldn't have, dodging where they shouldn't have etc.
I appreciate your feedback and hope I can add a lot more content come next demo day!!