This game was very fun! I got heavy Doom vibes as I was playing this.
Below, I will post my ratings for each category and my reasonings behind each rating I can be detailed with my feedback
Gameplay/Fun (5 Stars) - Honestly didn't see anything wrong with the gameplay design. I like the idea of tying your HP to your ammunition so you have to balance between spending essence to heal, waiting to kill the turrets until you have essence or risk killing yourself, etc. The design of the enemy types could've been a bit more varied. Both just shoot a projectile or beam, but for what it was they were still very well done.
Graphics/Art (4 Stars) - The low-res graphics really added to the theme of a deserted planet and the floating enemies and Deserted NPC are both creepy and add to that further.
Audio (4 Stars) - The music tracks sounding similar but more hyped up really let the player know the difficulty is ramping up. That and the SFX in general were all well placed and added to the game.
Theme (3 Star) - This game does fit the theme but the theme doesn't play much of a role in terms of game design. The only direct enhancement you feel as the player is the ability to shoot faster, but because you can't waste ammo freely or risk spending HP as ammunition, so the upgrade feels very risky to invest into. Enhancing the ship is the core plot device but, again, this has no bearing on gameplay itself.
Devlog (4 Star) - I liked the attention to detail, especially adding some insights into the methods behind many in-game actions.
Altogether a really solid game that I'd love to see get expanded on. This could sell well!