Thanks! I'm considering moving up all the cooler items like shields earlier in the game. My biggest worry was that there would be too much information overload in the beginning with having to learn about energy and energy systems.
The beginning is very harsh. I have been working on tweaking the generation of them to be a little under the difficulty curve to start things off. I may have to redesign the way I'm generating them though, since sometimes in harder levels you might find enemies that have sand and other weak blocks.
Thanks for your feedback! Need as much of it as I can to help me move forward.