[Challenge?] Twisty Little Passages

I've recently gotten back into playing Knytt Stories after abandoning it in favor of silly real-life nonsense, and this time I thought I would try my hand at building a level or two.

Really, this level is mostly about level building for its own sake, but I do have a story rumbling around that will probably get played out before the level is finished (it's very standard: betrayal, ancient ruins, older ruins under those, and the disgruntled spirits of the dead). I'd like the level to be challenging without being frustrating just for the sake of being frustrating -- I'm not sure if I'm on the road to achieving that yet or not.

Anyway, screenshots are below (and more are available on my website / blog if you're interested):

#1 - A suitably grim opening
#2 - The obligatory lava area (or is this a magma area? it is underground)
#3 - Part of the road to the double jump (this screen needs polish; it's a little sparse at the moment)
#4 - What you don't see here is the devious jumping puzzle immediately before this room

Ooh, that looks...okay. It just needs background objects. Other than that, it looks like a promising level. I kinda started out like this, too. :3

EDIT: Oh, almost forgot! PLEASE don't post screenshots in .JPG format. It makes it look bad. Post them in .PNG format.

no no No No NooOoOO! No more jpegs! The next person to do that, why I'll... I'll... *cough* sorry about that.

This level looks good so far. About background stuff, this is one of the few times it looks good without it. Really nice.

no no No No NooOoOO! No more jpegs! The next person to do that, why I'll... I'll... *cough* sorry about that.

This level looks good so far. About background stuff, this is one of the few times it looks good without it. Really nice.

There's nothing wrong with JPEGs  You can set the quality on high. 

Yes, but then the file size is larger

Anyway, I agree with Pumpkinbot that the backgrounds are a bit bland on their own.

Super-giant image jpegs are fine. Small photo jpegs are fine. Small pixel-based game jpegs, well...
And I disagree. The background looks bland, but it still looks good. Would help a bit, though.

He doesn't need a background for any of those. They're Hawt He's got too much land and things covering it to have a background.

But yeah, this looks like a cool level. I'll be watching it's development.
But what tileset did you use in the first screen to do those solid clouds?

Oh yah, just cus I'm a loser. JPEGS are for the win. I'mma post mine in that format now

Those clouds (I think) are the dull forest of boredom by Nifflas, tileset twenty-something.

K, cool. Thanks

The first screen is very cool! Keep it high. Hm... but you should try to work in a better way with the colour. As I said, the first screen is great but the screens below are a bit twisted.
However have fun =)

The first screen, great. The others... not so much in my taste 

I like the first and the third.

First of all: thanks to everyone for the comments so far.

In regards to the backgrounds being bland: they do vary a bit from place to place -- some of them I'm not happy with yet (sometimes this winds up being related to the tilesets I'm mashing together not having quite as many incidental background bits as I'd like, so I might put together some custom tile mashups to help with that), others are meant to be a bit simple either for mood (the opening shot) or to avoid clutter in puzzle rooms. But the feedback is definitely appreciated and I'll keep trying to add in detail wherever I feel like I can.

I don't love the tiles in the lava area. If I get round to replacing them I'll post a comparison shot to see what people think.

And just to confirm what Purple Pineapple already said: the first screen does use the Grey Forest of Boredom and The Cave and the Machine (tilesets 24 and 28), both by Nifflas.

I thought I'd add a few more screens (PNGs this time! I swear! I can't take another beating! Please!   ):

#1 - Climbing up towards daylight
#2 - The base of the mountain-y bit
#3 - The entrance to the "middle-aged" snowy ruins
#4 - A switch-and-traps room from the ruins

Are you going to be using any custom tilesets?

To **** with custom tilesets! This looks great!