Thank you!
For the ropes, I made them work with a Spring Joint 2D attached to one of the characters, then removed all of the springiness (so that the players can move on a perfect circle around each other). Then disabled the joint in code whenever distance between the characters was less than the distance allowed by the joint so that they could walk close to each other too. Then re-enabled it when they were greater than or equal to the distance allowed.
And yeah, it is totally intended for two player gameplay, but I'm glad the controls weren't too difficult for you solo! (I'm pretty sure 99% of people who play it are probably playing solo in a game jam).
Glad you liked it!