I think that's part of the beauty of it, it feels alien and threatening at first but given time you figure out the rules and physics interactions. They've made a few tweaks to soften the difficulty but the game is all the better for them and you still have to tread carefully. It's strongly skill based too. Using the starting wands I now have the reactions and knowledge to get through the first level without being hit, whereas it used to kill me half the time.
One helpful tip
Spoiler:
after the first level you can edit your wands in the temple. Switch the spell from the first wand into the bomb wand and you'll have yourself a machine gun.
At first I thought I'd never click with it but I think the lack of intuitiveness with the wands kind of works in the games favour and adds to the overall mystery. I believe you can hover over the spells with a mouse to get their name but I play on controller so haven't really done so. Even so I probably recognise about half the spells now as well as having a fairly sound understanding of the wand logic.
What level have you gotten to? I never die on the first two these days, but still only manage the third around half the time. You really need to be majorly lucky with wands and perks (especially
Spoiler:
invisibility
) to get through level four and beyond. Or be skilled in a way I am not. Later levels need balancing in my opinion, there's a major difficulty ramp, unless you're happy to stealth them.
After around twenty hours I'm taking a break until an update or three draw me back in. Still my GOTY by a mile.
I just realised today that I hadn't played it in a while so I had a few runs. I really like it too. Just need to put some more time into it and get a bit better, it gets on top of me pretty quick still. I do love it when it all goes to shit and everything is melting or on fire or melting and on fire.
My deaths were not particularly interesting though