hmm, every time after the shmup section at the end of drilling that you get from capturing enemies, the game will just freeze, leaving the drill floating there and me unable to do anything, other than change resolution and window size, P key makes some noise hinting some toggle triggered by it[edit: oh, that was just 120 Hz mode], but in the end I have to reset the game anyways.
edit: have tried the compatibility version, same issue. edit 3: works now, gonna see if it's related to excessive leveling of stat bonuses.
Figured it out: using the combat abilities on stat up section is what causes the issue.