Huh, thanks for the elaborate feedback!
More enemy types are of course one of the priority to-do elements, possibly even the first level will have some more. The archer was just one with the most complicated logic (they actually have to aim for a start) so a good enemy for a proof-of-concept. A pikemen comparatively is a very simple unit, but I also plan to add things like war machines, I have several ideas, will need to see how they play out code size and animation size-wise (that 60K is nasty). The pikemen is not a bad idea at all, it is a necessity
(as a close-range enemy which can do you a more substantial damage if you fail to avoid it, needing different strategy to cope with than archers).
You won't be able to get a flawless run. The dragon is a though guy, he can withstand a couple of hits, wouldn't care of a few arrows poking out of his hide. You don't need to perform a flawless run to get the maximal score, for that you would have to reach the goal faster (the current mechanics gives you 2 points for each second survived, however every remaining second will earn you three points upon completion, possibly I will even increase this difference in the final) preferably unscratched. If you can collect more health-improvements on the map than your max. health, then you won't miss score for losing some during your progress (the most striking example in the demo level is freeing the prisoners: if you don't want to kill, you will be hurt there, but there is a meat on the end of that corridor to compensate for the lost health).
So yes, the mechanics by this is quite different to ordinary platformers where you usually have a fixed number of lives, and often it is possible to do "perfect" runs (since they are usually designed so). You have to minimize your losses while aiming for maximizing your score by collecting items and doing stuff while being as fast as possible at it, and actually plowing through archers is about the most efficient strategy against this enemy as they mostly fail their shots then, especially if you are lucky to hit some with a fireball. Jumping also often gets you across unscratched, but that costs energy which is harder to replenish than your fire reserve, often that minuscule damage what a single arrow means doesn't worth more effort than trying to avoid it with a well aimed fireball.
If you stop, they may surround you, and soon you are under heavy fire, which I felt rather realistic (just consider the situation, even their in-game point of view, that they would want to grind you down). Keep moving!
I considered adding mauling, but in the end I didn't feel it useful enough for the gameplay to make it worth the extra animation frames taking away lots of ROM. I settled with that the dragon's anatomy might even make it less practical, so this deficiency may pass (he has a long neck, so he wouldn't be very efficient using his claws, he could bite, but why if he also has fire, may not even have too powerful jaws as he doesn't need to rely on that). Another thing on my mind about this were that the controls are already a bit complex, I wouldn't want to add one more capability unless it was essential (walking by the way sometimes is useful to position yourself precisely - hint!). I will re-consider it, though, later, as a context-specific action (like for destroying a war machine or a door), but for now it feels like it wouldn't really worth it.
My maximal score by the way is 1480 points, that's a fast run collecting everything with zero kills, but certainly not flawless (so the default score written in the EEPROM is passable).
Which game do you mean by
Platz?
B.C. Dash?