Played through a couple more levels tonight! And I have another to share for the people who like hard levels.
I haven't played your other levels, but I feel like what you're saying about your style preference for levels comes through really clearly in this one, even if you were attempting to aim it toward Endless.
I know personally I have a different tolerance between picking levels individually and playing through Endless, and I don't think I would have skipped yours during Endless, so that's a least a bit of an endorsement. It's possible to die, and the level is long, but you give ample powerups and don't have any sections designed to just churn through lives. The only thing that might make me skip is the length, but including checkpoints really helps with that.
You can tell that there's some cleverness in design going on under the surface, but weirdly I think that takes away from it a little. Because we can't open levels we play in the editor, it's harder to appreciate any sort of hidden elements for their cleverness, and I would prefer them to be out in the open, as much as possible.
As another poster said, there's nothing wrong with designing to your own preferences. It can be good to step outside of them for a bit just to add tools to the toolbox, but I think levels with a coherent, strong vision tend to show that through and be memorable.
Played all but the single-room puzzle (not my type of level at all). Icicle Caves makes for a good speedrun, even if the fast path is made pretty obvious. It's short and high on execution points so that feels satisfying for someone like me who likes to try and optimize those WR times.
Silence in the Gloom is a clever idea and a fun way of testing observation. As a minor point, I think it might actually just not work for people who play with sound off or are deaf, as some of the sounds have no visual trigger. Also, For the final room where you have to pick which place to drop down, I didn't hear any noise or see any indication of where to go. Maybe I missed it but I would have been pretty annoyed at that if I didn't happen to guess correctly. Good use of the atmospheric elements overall though.
Cascading Conundrum happens to be very similar to a level I just uploaded, though yours is a bit harder and more of a puzzle than mine. Unfortunately even after going through twice I missed the second key, and I didn't feel like doing a third just to find everything, so it's pretty well hidden IMO. I think the issue with your level (and mine) is that the length and backtracking will put some people off, and the ones it doesn't put off completely will still not be compelled to explore completely, as the level is already long enough. But maybe that's just me. In any case I enjoy playing in the clear pipes so I still enjoyed this one, even if I was a little disappointed at the reward for getting to all the red coins.
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In case you're interested, here's my Maze-of-clear-pipes level
Giantside Pipeworks
5LT-5C7-FNF
This is a short red-coin hunt with a small bit of powerup-based progression, and a boss fight.
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If you like hard levels, though, my latest upload might be for you.
The Great Tree Cave Challenge
KJY-HB1-SQG
SMB style
Super-Expert difficulty targeted
This is a level about patience, observation, and execution. Each challenge is meant to be pursued carefully and understood, not rushed through. The stakes are high though, as there are no powerups, and carelessness will lead to death.
I tried to make this as a straight-ahead challenge, with very little that should feel trollish (well, there might be one or two things, but again, it's about observation). A repeated theme is finding the moment where multiple elements line up to find a way through, though for most obstacles there's more than one way to get through, and possible some I didn't think of during design.
I actually had this level made over a week ago, but couldn't do the full-level clear with no checkpoints. I was stubborn for a while, but the problem came down to two jumps in succession that required extreme precision. In the end, I decided it was
too much, even for a level designed to be hard, so I made a small adjustment. I want my levels to be fun, even if hard, and I think the old version would have been too annoying to be enjoyable. Maybe most people will still think this one is! At least anyone beating it in Endless will almost certainly end with 3 1-Ups.
RepairmanJack,
BlueManifest,
Kamek, calling you all out to try this one!