So, right, let's talk about what I enjoyed 'bout the game first. It had a strong & consistent art direction going on - I wish the player sprites were better proportioned with the environment since it felt like the player was too big a lot of the time, but everything looks neat, and the music is good!
Now I wanna talk about the gameplay a little bit, here are some things that stuck out to me the most:
- Choosing to reload last backup (reload checkpoint) spawns you one hit away from dying again. Why :(
- Choosing to shut down shuts off the game instead of returning you to the file select screen. Why :((( This made getting through the first level and to the next save point a massive hassle!!!
- Movement is very slippery, I think you should make it more precise by increasing the acceleration/deceleration of the character way more.
- The melee attack just kinda didn't work at times, I completely relied on the gun to attack enemies.
- Speaking of the enemies, I feel like all of them were kind of just unfair to you. The gun shoots from faraway, even from offscreen, so you can't see the warning quickly enough to parry, and the moving turrets/guns(?) have large hitboxes. The boss, uh... I somehow had her spawn with zero health and all I did was shoot at her a few times to take her down. Not sure how that happened.
Also, the metroidvania aspect wasn't captured too well, in my opinion. You have all your abilities at the start like Aria said and there aren't any skill gates or doors to open, so it's a very linear path from start to end. I think it's a fine platformer with fine-tuning towards enemies and player control, but it has some ways to go before it can be a true metroidvania.
But honestly, for a jam game I appreciate the effort in making everything look polished and fun. I'm sure it could be much more awesome with more time and love!