I played using the SDK, which gave me a popup warning that it runs faster than a normal Playdate, and I think that explains others' issue with the gravity being too strong. Even with that in consideration, I felt the difficulty curve wasn't completely smooth, with hard levels being followed by easy levels (an issue that Rocket Bits also has). Notably, the ability to keep energy cells after death means you don't have to worry about backtracking in the final level since you can just die to get back faster. Maybe a good compromise would be to have them work like standard checkpoints and respawn you where they were, then have all levels utilize them to some extent? There were a few non-energy-cell levels I felt went on a bit too long, particularly the ones that had the Y-formation saws that required very precise moving around despite the player's hitbox not being all that clear-cut (it was better in the first game).
dang you’re digging deep. Yeah I fully agree about the difficulty curve, I didn’t actually finish the last few levels until the day of the release so I didn’t have much time to test and reorganize them, plus, I am not good at judging the difficulty of something I’ve made. If I made it, it’s easy to me. The not worrying about backtracking was an intentional thing as you still do it at the cost of a life (if I ever get access to the PD leaderboard system there’s gonna be a board for least deaths) but I should probably add something to the main menu too so there’s a reason not to die. The saw ones are the same deal about not having time, and the hitbox is always at the middle of the player and smaller than it is in Rocket Bits so I thought it would probably be fine but I understand that it wasn’t made super clear
>I understand that [the hitbox] wasn’t made super clear
It's more than just that, though (if I didn't make myself clear last time). Graphics need to represent the hitbox if you're going to make a game requiring precision; that way, the player can literally *see* what to do, like in Rocket Bits. Once the required opening is smaller than your sprite, however, you as a player can never be sure HOW close you can get without trial-and-error (and then it's something you have to remember instead of something intuitive). It's the same problem a lot of bullet-hell games have.
EDIT: also, in regards to the Halloween levels, you shouldn't overlay the required white fuel cells over the white decorative background tiles because that makes them easy to miss.
>not having time
What do you mean? The game is self-published, right? What's stopping you from delaying the release for a bit to make sure everything works as intended?