Really? That's good to know. I didn't even test drive 8 vs 9, and I don't have SD2IEC either.
The manual does explain this, but the basic reason is this: it takes time to change into, or out of, armor, so doing so uses up one of your turns. It returns you to "real time" / main view when you do either, so that you can see monsters/etc. trying to hit you, or move closer, etc.
You have hit points (the heart icon at lower/right). When those get to 0, either through combat, or magic, you are dead.
In the demo only, it "kills" you after the 3rd floor, because the demo only has 3 floors. Apologies about the suddenness of that, but I basically have zero bytes left right now. In the real game, of course, that would never happen, and you have 25+ floors to play with.
This is covered in the manual (did I mention it will come with a beautiful manual?), but it's pretty true to Rogue in this sense: go to the bottom, find the magic thingie, fight your way back out to daylight, don't get killed by monsters, Lich King, or the surprise.
Music was a stretch goal but unfortunately, the budget is spent. I would have to drop features which I think add more (I could be wrong) to gameplay than the music, in order to free up space for a minimalist player, and of course, space for the tune.
It autosaves at the end of each level, so if you die on level 2, and do Restore, you start again on level 2. (different MAP is generated though).
Err... what would I need to do to support PAL machines? VDC is same chip for both, I think? I'll do what I can, but would need some help.
Absolutely hope to. I am a newbie at this part of it, and am learning as I go. A friend said it could be cheaper to sell the overseas ones via eBay, because eBay apparently consolidates all international shipping, making it cheaper. I don't have final boxes yet, and don't know final weight, but will be looking into that in June.
Thanks for testing!