This game is super pretty!! Like, the UI, the character, the animations! Superb!
The gameplay was also fun. I didn't end up paying much attention to the meter to the left, but I liked the idea. Not requiring 100% to complete the level I think is veeery smart. Also, the bonus phase is a pretty cool idea, I liked trying to think ahead before it triggered.
The levels were visually interesting and fun to traverse.
I didn't really like when enemies swarmed a place (like >3 enemies in a reduced area), because I didn't know how to really deal with them. I kind of hang around waiting or went somewhere else, which I didn't like doing. Unless I had an item of course. On the other hand, dodging enemies when there were few of them was fun (because I could dodge them and it was more manageable to walk through the tiles I wanted to).
Hitting enemies with items is really fun. Why not have a default weak item at the start of the game?
Something strange in retrospect, is that there's too much difference between having an item and not having one. Like, items are reeally strong, once you get them you're guaranteed to clear lots of tiles in the order you want without having to worry too much about the enemies. In that context, I also find it weird that item drops are random. I don't feel like a game that heavily focuses on rewarding skill (with the grading and such) should have something that randomly decreases the difficulty of the level. If I'm not mistaken, the same spawn points are used for both enemies and weapons right? That's a bit strange, I think.
My first thought is to make items less strong, and have them appear more often less randomly (somehow), but still keeping the 'use limit' and the 'random weapon type' to add some spice and variability. But idk, it's just a thought, maybe it's a bad idea.
Anyway, I recorded myself playing just in case it's useful to you.
Cheers