So there's 2 weeks left, I'm pretty close to being done with my game (REM: Digital Dreams)
ever since I began with this concept I've had a system for theming levels and how you get from one to another. Felt like getting my idea out here just in case others might be interested in doing something similar. Just keep in mind a spoiler warning if you wanna play my game when it's done without knowing about this system, because it'll probably be a lot more interesting exploring blindly :)
below will be the explanation. stop reading if you aren't interested!
Basically, the game is divided into 3 layers; A, B and C. Each layer gets progressively more dynamic and bizarre as you go. That's what I explain in the beginning and that's the basic thing to know to get farther. However, there's a little more going on beyond that. Basically, each area has 2 connections leading to the next layer (with an exception to the final one, but I'll get to that!). One is positive (+) and the other is negative (-). Why does this matter? An area marked as positive will be brighter and more pleasant, while the other will be darker and more surreal. From A1 (the starting point) it divides to B1 (+) and B2 (-). from B1 it divides to C1 (++) and C2 (+-) and B2 has C3 (-+) and C4 (--). Take note that there aren't B3 or B4 or any other areas besides A1 in A I'm accounting for right now.
This is the basic functions for how it works. However, from here it gets a bit more complex when I introduce endings and backwards progression. Once again if you wanna play my game, stop here!
For endings, this only applies to the final layer, C. Once you have gotten here, your goal should be to find some exit. Some things might take you backwards and you should try to avoid those! they can either backtrack you (or even worse, get you to an even darker place than you may be now...) If you find the proper exit, the game has 3 semi unique types of endings. For the game jam release it'll only have 1 placeholdery ending due to time constraints, however the 3 endings will depend on if you went the full positive path, the full negative path or somewhere in between.
With backwards progression, this is where areas previously inaccessible in earlier layers become accessible. The game will be smaller in the game jam version, but when I update it to the full version later, I will include 5 more areas that you may progress backwards to... how it will work is that, depending on which positivity level you're at it'll take you go that corresponding one in the previous layer. This third connection will be harder to access, because even though you're technically going back a layer, you're kind of getting even deeper as well. It's effectively extra layers. What I mean, is if you're at C3 (-+), you'd go to B3, and if you're at B4 (--?) you'll go to A4. I will just warn you, the more negative the mood is for that level, as you go back the more intense that mood will become. Stuff might be lurking in A4 that not even anything else on this strange world would want to end up spotted by...
That wraps up this community post. If you're stuck on how you want to implement linking, feel free to use something similar to this!