That was pretty groovy. I really liked the way you made the player spawn in the level, with the empty frame and all. Makes me want to do something similar in my area.

I'm really digging the new corner shadows and the custom creatures! I especially liked the custom bouncing ball and the splashes it made when jumping on the water. Really nice touch. Also, I have to admit that the "artiFact" thing made me grin like a doofus.

I compiled a list of issues and suggestions while I played. Feel free to fix whatever you think is worth the trouble and discard the rest. Oh, and sorry for the wall of text :P

* The enemy placement feels off in some screens that I think are better suited for a peaceful vibe. E.g: I wanted to check out the new creature in x1006y996, but I kept being killed by fireballs while trying to do so. Alternatively, you could just move the creature to a peaceful screen and keep the challenge there.

* x1004y999: Placing the spiky mole so close to the entry point before the save point can be used feels like a cheap way to kill the player and force them to replay a bunch of screens for no good reason. It's not that big of a deal since those screens aren't particularly hard, but even so, it's somewhat annoying. I'd suggest either replacing this enemy with a harmless creature or giving the player a chance to save after they've collected the climb power-up.

* x1000y999: You can reach the cliff on the left by double-jumping from the ledges in the screen below, and climbing the wall leads to a void screen. Also, there are two solid tiles right below the waterfall you can climb, which feels weird.

* x1003/1004y999: It's possible (albeit quite difficult) to get past the ghost wall and eaters after you get the eye by executing a precise jump and landing on the safe spot right next to the wall. Not sure if this is intentional. If it is, I think it's a big difficulty spike for what seems to be a Normal challenge level, and it also makes it rather tricky to get back into the cave from the starting area. If this wasn't your intention, you could just block the path using ghost blocks (Bank12 Obj5) instead.

* When I first reached the end of the area, I hadn't found artifact #2 yet, so I tried going back. However, I was unable to reach the wall at x1010y999 with only the double-jump. It'd be nice if the player had a chance to retrace their steps (other than just pressing CTRL+R) without having to restart the area from the beginning. I suspect this was intentional, judging from the flag warps you set there, but it still feels a bit frustrating.

* x1006y993: Coming back to this screen from x1007y993 while on the upper path results in an instant death, since the spider-thing is placed right on the edge.

* x1008y995: The background tiles behind the waterfall being solid while the waterfall itself is on the background feels off. I'd suggest either making these tiles non-solid or placing the waterfall on the foreground (Obj layer 6-7).

Lovely! I appreciate the flag-based level variability, and the comments you put in World.ini explaining it. I have some suggestions to add to VG's list:

* x996/997y1000: Ambiance 1 feels a little wrong for an endless ocean to me.

* x1006y997: The chomping enemy coming out of a thin metal platform is pretty comical, possibly in a detracting way.

* x1010y1001: This screen is a little less detailed than x1010y999, so I'm wondering if it missed out on the rock adding phase.

Just in case you weren't aware, you can replace the files uploaded to game pages on this site, so I feel there's no need to go deleting a recreating pages if you want to make smaller updates.