I've been playing this for over an hour and still haven't finished yet, very well done! I love that some of the rooms actually remind me of original Metroid rooms (especially the vertical ones). I'm really impressed with what upfront seemed like such a simple premise turned out to be such an expansive game. There's also some really good design work here from the various abilities to the well thought-out routing which naturally leads you to the next goal despite reusing a lot of the same rooms for different routes - and then there are the challenge hearts. Very well done!
Some feedback:
- I'm sure it's obvious, but this needs some kickass cowboy tunes.
- I thought the first bandit was an NPC cause he didn't attack me so I faceplanted into him and died. :P In lieu of designing a new enemy AI for him, you could potentially put him in an environment that seems more threatening or maybe have the wanted sign above him.
- The controls initially felt too fast and manic, but I got used to them as I played. There were a few hiccups with several of the shot gun jumps being extremely tight as well as bull rush jumping from/onto steep slopes being frustrating at times, but they were both still very fun mechanics so to me it's just a matter of polishing them up.
Great entry, I'm definitely going to finish it (I just got the dynamite, so I think all I'm missing is a winter coat perhaps? I'm pretty low on heart containers though haha).