It's interesting you are talking about these points because they have been a problem for me during the development.
The lack of any actual attack sprite and having to 'push' into the enemy in the latter really kills the fun of combat for me. I just feel no sense of actual contact with the enemy at all.
I haven't added attack animation because i thought they weren't needed, why ? Because Gauntlet didn't have it

But i must admit it's a lack, and i'll try to add them.
But before that, i have to found memory, for now it remains exactly 9bytes free, but
@Targhan promise me a gain of 500kb of memory with the new arkos2 player.
I was using the push to fight because the fire button was already used for throw dagger and open inventory and Gauntlet works like that (but the fight is more based on missile weapon). I can try to see if the fight with fire button is more intesting.
And while the slower speed on low food may make some sort of real world sense i guess, the speed changes just make the game seem quite frustrating to me.
I'm agree it's too much annoying. Maybe i should replace the slow down effect with a fight malus and a more important lose of life.
To the people who played with DW, what do you think about that ?
Thanks for feedback
@Carnivius