"I should explain, this game is meant to be like Castlevania games such as Symphony of the Night, Dawn of Sorrow, etc. Rules like enemies responding after leaving a room or being able to cancel attacks with dodge are a part of it and I won't change it. ... I also don't think Castlevania has ledge forgiveness, but I will need to check to make sure if that is a thing or not in the games."
Indeed, I've played SotN, and a couple of the GBA Castlevanias. The influence is obvious, and it's great! The game already feels super authentic to its inspiration without being completely identical (I love the Megaman X-style wall jumping). That being said, I must express that I hate this way of thinking. I don't think anything should be done in game dev purely for the reason of "that's the way games in the past did it," particularly when you have clear options to improve upon it in front of you. Of course, my suggestion was only my opinion about it, and you will (rightly) make it the way you want it to be.
For whatever it's worth, I contributed to this project a while back: https://arikado.itch.io/clarent-demo
I've tried using an Xbox 360 gamepad and even when connecting it prior to launching the game haven't been able to get anything out of it. Once you have proper gamepad support and have worked out all the input issues though I'll be looking forward to trying this again. It already seems like a lot of fun, just the controls are killing me currently.
By the way, a good way to make sure the player doesn't miss a save point is to force them to go into it. This would be an especially good idea to do with the game's first one.