Thanks for your feedback!
I've been collecting a lot of feedback from around SMASH, which was the first time I've demo'd the game outside of strictly "gaming" related events. The delays and lag at the beginning and end of attacks are intentional (assuming you don't mean actual input lag on your monitor). That said I'll be tuning down the difficulty a little bit, specifically the enemy placement and level design as well as input timings, to be a bit less demanding.
Right now the list includes:
- Giving roll less end-lag
- Making the mountain goat less resilient (parry should stun him)
- Doing a better job overall of giving visual feedback for when enemies are about to attack, what can be parried etc.
- Making the boss fight clearer, with slightly less demanding timings.
The game is designed to have higher than average difficulty, but I think I agree with the general feedback that right now it's a bit *too* difficult especially for the first chapter, and that there's a lot more I can do to make the game more fair to the player.
As you know this release is an alpha, so I'm doing my best to make Insignia as polished and enjoyable as possible before the first chapter's full release.
Thanks again