Hi, I really enjoyed playing the beta! I'm always on the lookout for games like this. I have some feedback for you, hope you don't mind:
The movement controls have some weird acceleration on them that makes it difficult to predict. If I had to guess, you did this to allow for small movements with a digital control scheme (the keyboard WASD). But small movements didn't feature heavily in your level design. I think you could resolve this issue by continuing to avoid the need for it in level design and eliminate the acceleration on movement.
Most enemies in the beginning of the game are in areas that can't be reached by the player, at least not right away. When they drop powerups, they are generally unobtainable. Metroid Prime had an interesting way of solving this problem: when you charge up your shot, it draws powerups in to the player. Another way you could handle this is to give the powerups gravity to make them drop down. Just a few ideas on how to solve this issue that frustrated me when I was low on health and could see the health pickup, but couldn't get it.
The level design progressively gets better in the beta, but it starts off weird. The starting area is really barren, which makes sense if you are teaching the player how to jump or crouch or shoot in a safe environment. However, the length between "teaching moments" is really long and it feels like I am simply walking forward, waiting for something to happen. I think you could cut out entire areas and make it more interesting.
That's all I have for now, keep up the good work! I'm looking forward to seeing the new character direction in action, it looks really cool!
TheMageling
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