Thanks for taking time to play my demo again! I appreciate it!
I should definitely find a way to inform players that they have to crouch and hit power-ups to collect them. I did this because just collecting them on collision would have made it hard for the player to see what they were getting in the midst of combat (although in retrospect I'm not sure it matters since all of them are beneficial). Yes, you do lose power-ups as the stage ends--none of them last longer than a few seconds, and I found a bug in my code that makes them stay on permanently if the player clears the stage with a power-up active, so I chose to shut them off during the transition.
As for the challenge of avoiding damage, there are ways. The enemies don't get any stronger or weaker, and their behaviors are very exploitable (there are other moves the player can do that may help). The player character does get stronger at times. I just realized that's something else I have to find a way to explain: there's a gauge under the health bar that builds up as the player strikes enemies, and she can 'level up' and deal more damage, but getting hit reduces the gauge. It peaks at level 3, indicated by the player sprite flashing, and she deals much more damage, but it's temporary and goes back to the baseline after a while.
One key to success in the game is learning how to use Dash Kick and Stomp to kick off enemies and keep bouncing off targets, staying mobile. This is something that I'd hoped players would pick up on their own through gameplay, but I may have to find a way to train that as well. Perhaps I should make some challenge rooms or some kind of test.
Thanks again for the feedback. I am going to consider a different way for the player to grab powerups (which are coded to spawn more frequently if the player takes damage more often). As an old-school gamer who grew up without tutorials myself, I leaned toward telling the player less and letting them figure out things more, but I may need to consider a finer balance.