I can see some immense improvements, it was the right decision to remove falling damage, it gives me an incentive to explore every nook and cranny. The option to skip dialogues is amazing! It's cool to hear them the first time but not over and over again. This time i've managed to reach the color flip zone and meet my new friends *yellow pushing blocks*. Unfortunately, somewhere in between it was the last zone as well.
I don't know if the lack of checkpoints is intentional but for me it's a little drawback. I wish I could just restart on the same zone. It's a chore to start all over again. Maybe some difficulty tweaks for folks like me would help, easy mode, restart mode or something:).
I can't say much about upgrades. Because in games like this one i usually go the power route with double jumps, speed, dash etc. rather than attack and raw damage Upgrades were fine even though dash is too weak for my taste and I didn't have any reasons to use it.
Good luck with the future updates!