I really like this mechanic. It reminds me of Pokemon or Kirby in all the best ways, but it has a really interesting style. It has a high difficulty curve, but as I got more used to the game and learned the tricks, it started feeling more fair and felt really rewarding. Because your art style is so nice, it would be really good to see this worked on more to animate all the characters!
Here’s my game if you’d like try it out.