Hey Psychic Chicken! Thanks for playing and for the thoughtful feedback!
I see what you mean about the spin. My idea was for longer spins to give more damage, reach, and even double hits, but I agree the spinning itself could have been more mechanically explicit.
About the health, the idea was to reward exploration and also work as a kind of self-adjusting difficulty: you can collect more hearts/souls to make things safer, or skip them and go straight to the boss. But yeah, I can see how going too far beyond the normal limit can make falling feel like the main danger.
Thanks again, really useful feedback!