Thanks for playing and the detailed feedback! I saw you streamed it but I missed unfortunately.
Bullets did not damage barrels [...] bullets completely flew over the top of the crate
Right, it looks silly but it's like that since it was going to be ore deposits until last minute, and you can't really shoot that out. And yes the crate is due to being too short, I should let you shoot it though.
lag spike
Shader compilation. I haven't got to setting up a system to spawn everything to cache it, though the next engine update apparently massively speeds it up.
Having my bullets stuck in enemies was a bit frustrating
I can see where you're coming from, but I feel like the old way of always bouncing off enemies has its own issues. Like if you shoot point blank you get all of your ammo back instantly always, or from a distance it means the ammo becomes more spread out and harder/annoying to recollect. Plus you can be a wuss and shoot then run around to recollect ammo before shooting again. So all in all, I feel like the stuck bullets balance out the combat to encourage both shooting and melee. Though maybe there's a compromise in here somewhere. Regardless, there will be some enemy types that are too hard to get stuck in, like rock golems.
wish the [melee] reach was longer and there was less of a delay between attacks
I'm kinda surprised, I felt that the melee was maybe too fast. Certainly as is, it's too easy to infinite stunlock. But with range yeah maybe just a tad too short. It doesn't help how you're fighting spearlizards with this weapon. Not sure what I can really do to improve it. Maybe I need to reconsider it as a fast or slow archetype instead.
The dashing and sliding feels a bit cumbersome, especially in such close quarters. [..] but I found myself wanting a quick dash/hop instead of something I had to hold. [...] as far as I could tell the slide only gives you more rotational control [...] I would want to see how the game might play if dashing was just one button and releasing it let you slide
So to start, yeah it was tuned for larger arenas, the standard room will likely be 2x the current one, and there will probably be corridors between rooms. I may reduce the penalty for running into things. In regards to a dodgeroll, you're right. I gave myself a personal challenge to avoid it, I feel like too many games do it so I'm invested in trying out other methods of avoidance. We'll see how it works out. Sliding lets you slide under some obstacles or future large enemies (not shown). And it lets you make smaller turns mid sprinting, which otherwise would have a larger cooldown to stop then start again. That said, you're right I don't like how it's another button. It used to also toggle crouching, but that was when the game was slower paced. Not sure if I'll reenable it. If so, I may have to consider a new way of actioning it, like what you mentioned.
Thanks for that, so far no one else has dug into the combat to nitpick it this much; regardless of if it changes, having some pushback is always nice to fully think about the design space. Hope it's more to your liking next time.