Thank you! That's a huge compliment, to address your points, I see where you're coming from about the contact damage, it does suck, but it is quite necessary in games like these, otherwise it introduces too much cheese, and the way the boss movement is designed, he will never touch you on purpose, you need to walk into him. I do think I could've improved the logic to make him ebb and flow towards and away from you to make it less likely to walk straight into him. That was actually how it worked during development, but it made it feel very robotic, especially with high movement. I do agree with you on the attack response though, it's currently bugged where you can animation cancel your attacks into the next one, which is what I think you were experiencing, thanks for that, fix is on the way. And yes, definitely an oversight on the health thing. Thank you for your feedback, glad you enjoyed!
Animation canceling, that makes sense. I tend to spam my attack button lol.
I agree that something should discourage getting right on top of your opponent, and contact damage works, but doesn't necessarily need to be the solution. For example, could be a quick kick that has high knockback and stun.
I still think making your character always facing your opponenet could help alleviate getting too close on accident, because you won't have to walk towards your opponent in order for your attack to be aimed in the correct direction.
Something else I thought of that could help is to make movement have acceleration. Doesnt have to be alot, just enough to not be 0 to 100 in one frame. Especially when your speed stat is higher, having a few frames where you're not at max speed could be helpful for micro adjusting your spacing.