very stylish. i found the sort of tank controls / dungeon crawler controls a bit awkward but definitely very flavorful. perhaps the most interesting aspect of the controls is dodging... to pull off a dodge you have to kind of quickly turn and then move. it is satisfying to pull off, although i am definitely bad at it.
it was nice to sort of get a sense of where things vaguely were as i kept playing through the game. i think the map helps a lot with not getting completely lost, as it's at least possible to anchor landmarks to "down and to the right" even if not exact locations.
i think a little bit more interactivity/ui for the key holes could help ease people into the game. i figured the doors were probably locked but i think it helps sell the idea if they tell you in some way (e.g. if they jiggle when you try to open them without a key or whatever).
i ended up having sufficient health to get through the game, although i did lose one lady in the final battle. it's not clear to me exactly what will happen if you are defeated (i tried starting the game again and getting defeated) but the game seems forgiving enough in terms of health. there was nonetheless some tension in that i didn't know if i would lose a lot of progress on defeat so i was very careful to avoid taking too much damage.
in terms of the enemy hitbox thing, i was able to sometimes get them to disappear by stepping away, but it didn't seem very consistent. i guess when you say disappear you mean they have to vanish into the distance, rather than be simply behind our view.
speaking of which, i did wonder when playing if enemies would be able to ambush me from behind. i never really found out. (actually, i just found out when writing this. the game was sort of idling and an enemy attacked me from behind. welp. that answers that).
meta note: the game is still quarantined for me. :( every time i see the popup i am more and more convinced it is a malware related popup rather than a "too horny for itch" related popup, which is both somewhat encouraging and really frustrating at the same time. at least you're not alone, i'm in the same boat. :P (my takeaway is to just never ever upload another embedded pck game to itch).
the procedural generation is very cool. my map seemed like a pretty coherent level all together. the gold key building was very recognizable, for example. i also liked the variety of the different building configurations (wood, stone, etc). it is neat how the final boss fight gets locked away behind the final door.
good job!