Hey,
I gave it another try. Yes, you are right, the controls were explained at the beginning, however, I am very positive that many people do not read the full instructions and only catch a glimpse, just like I did. I never read full text, I just quickly skim what looks interesting and go. Once I knew how to control the soldiers, it was a lot easier and there were no input delays.
I still believe that selecting a unit and then controlling it with arrow keys might be a better user experience. You mentioned that clicking a soldier will make it swing an axe, but what about adding another key to do that instead? For example, Z. There is also an accessibility consideration here: not everyone may be able to constantly move the mouse to keep hovering over a soldier while simultaneously pressing arrow keys, whether due to motor difficulties or simply the physical awkwardness of the two-hand split. A click-to-select model would make the game more accessible to a wider range of players.
Another thing I noticed: after bringing 8 soldiers into the tent the level completes, but I still had 2 soldiers left and 60 seconds on the timer, and the game did not end. I had to wait it out because I had no more left/right moves available. I think the game should end when you complete the objective, unless you want to give some kind of bonus for the extra soldiers? But if the player doesn't want to go for that, there should be a way to skip it.
Sorry about the OS. I should have mentioned it. I ran it on Windows 11 build 25H2 26200.8457. Hope this helps. 🙂
Regards,
Remi