Live thoughts:
Straight away, Beginning of Salvation already has so much cool stuff going on all up and down it. The sludgy bass sound in Horrible Village sounds like you've reused in a few places is fire and fits that old school shooter vibe you were going for spot on. Loving those psybient style pops and splashes in Caves, they really bring the verb out and create a sense of weird cavernous spaces. And they stick around and do the same sorta thing in sewers. Really love the lead in to the first big synth sound in sewers, I coulda had a lot more of that on it's own. Rock and Stalagmites brings the chunky guitar vibes in to hammer out an intense sounding track. Oh dang, the bass in Underwater Serpent goes hard and the cleaner section at 1:25 really feels like an epic confrontation. Clarity in purpose, and that purpose is messing that boss up!
I love the sound design on the melody in Train. The big industrial machinery style SFX coming up harder in the second half felt great too. Really dig it. Among the boxes doing it too, I'm a real sucker for that big clanky percussion and it's delivering that in spades. I felt like Raising the Crow's Nest felt a little too close to previous tracks, the big organ coming in was nice though. National Emblem coming back and beefing up those big clanky percussive beats is my *jam*, and it had real midgame boss energy. The kinda enemy that's threatening but not the big bad. The organ mixed with the big industrial sounds is giving me 40k soundtrack vibes. Respite worked well and I like the idea of the resurrection fakeout. Cat and Mouse dropping into the frantic pace felt good and I could picture the chase. Love the acid bassy sounds on it too.
Metro in the City's vocal samples gave it a nice unique feel compared to previous tracks., and really felt like a shift in zone after the bossfight. Rest zone had a nice eerie vibe to it - very much "You're safe here.. until you're not.", a zone for recuperating, not relaxing. Queens Archives is rad, I can see where you're going with the freezing devices thought and I can picture things being a cleaner, shinier tech level compared to the dirty industry dieselpunk vibes I got from earlier levels. Oooh the leaaaaads on Full Metal Temple! That's the kinda level you stick around in to hear the music loop on so you're not missing out. The sound design on the high synth in particular has old school B-movie feelings at times, and I really dug the combination with the grittier sounds. Not as into Green Stage, but it felt like it was filling the lead in spot for Chaotic Stage and combined I enjoyed them. Elements coming in and out and being so layered which has been consistent throughout feels really prominent here. Patient Zero has good final confrontation energy, I think I enjoyed the more atmospheric tracks from earlier more, but it makes for a good climax.
Overall:
My favourite tracks were probbably the combination of Train + Among the Boxes, and Beginning of Salvation. Really loving how very deep and textured the tracks are in general. I gotta get some tips sometime! And 20 tracks? You've gotta have a heck of a workflow. Nice!