Splitting into gameplay and decoration...
Gameplay
Not really impressive. Sure, the basics are done well: the layout syncs, (although the sync do fall apart in some places) there aren't unfair parts, and the level generally works smoothly.
However, I think the layout could have more coherence with the mood of the song. For example, when the song has ascending notes, maybe design your layout to rise slightly, and vice versa. When the song drops, consider using faster speeds like 2x or 3x instead of just normal speed. Ultimately, because the layout don't match the song, the layout just feels like a random layout instead of one for the song. I think it's a great pity especially when this song is easily exploitable IMO, having sharp upturns and clear slow and fast parts.
Apart from that, here are some more specific tips.
- 2%: That key is not easily visible yet it is needed for passing the spikes afterwards. This is not good because players can easily feel like they are cheating. Try putting the key in a descent, or make the player jump and return to the same height before jumping again to reach the key. Camera positions matter.
- 7% to 16%: An auto part taking up 9% of the level is alarming. This is because the player just sits and watches the cube gets tossed around (or even worse in this part, sliding on the ground) when they are supposed to jump and avoid obstacles. There's another auto part in this level which also takes up a considerable proportion of the level right at my next point.
- 39% to 54%: Another auto part. That tallies up to nearly one-fourth of the level! Although you set this into a easier difficulty, at no point should a player sit for 10 seconds just looking at cutscenes, no matter how fascinating they looks. Jumps should be spread evenly across the level, even when you want them to be more sparse.
- 40% to 46%: Don't fling the cube that high because they cannot even see where the cube is going. This just makes the screen looks real empty. Autos in levels usually don't travel a long vertical distance, because of the camera, again, the camera.
- 54%: I would add something to signify the drop. Either a launch pad, or a player input. Currently the player input should be made before the start of the drop, which feels quite awkward. Again, I'll link back to what I said about coherence with the level - design for the music.
- 78%: You do not need to scale spikes in ball. If you want them to take more vertical space, using two spikes and putting one of them 1 block higher will do. (of course use blocks to connect the spikes to the ground, which I will talk about later in the deco part)
- Try jumping between platforms. It needs a huge amount of blocks, sure, but it can introduce ascension and descension easily, which is really useful.
Decoration
It does not really satisfy the high standards of 2.1 deco. If you look around, 40k objects is the soft limit and you can expand this to 80k or remove it entirely with hacks. Almost every single level rated in a couple years (already rob 2.2 pls) have that red plus sign under the level name, signifying that the level uses more than 40k objects. Using 6k objects is really really little.
'How do you manage to use so much?' you would ask. That's because they add layers in decoration and they add a lot of detail into the mix. That's why premade blocks in the editor won't be your best bet - they are just not complex enough. You added background to your level, but a large amount of air decoration is missing, making the level feels really empty.
Also, you seem to do transitions rather poorly. Simply fading in a black screen that covers everything will already help covering up borders of deco, making them look continuous.
Here are some more specific feedback.
- 5%: 3D lines have a different colour channel than normal outline for blocks (which is usually 1 IIRC) but they should have the same colour in most cases. But honestly, I don't think coloured outlines actually work in most of the cases, including this one. I would rather keep it white and make other blocks change colour.
- 10%: Might as well get non-static blocks to spin because it makes the bar looks more rigid rather than being torn to bits when rotating and reassembling back together.
- 12%: Make line channel black to hide that line.
- 17%: Don't fade and don't enter (found in group settings) allows blocks to stay in full opacity even when they are at the edges. Extremely useful in making effects, try using them in your future projects.
- 17% to 27%: The background has too high opacity. It steals the focus from the blocks in front of them, rendering the blocks hard to read. Usually blocks have a higher brightness than the background, so consider using darker colours and lower the alpha of those stars.
- 31%: Connect pads to blocks. Floating pads do not look nice. Just slightly move the 'pillars' downwards if you need to, just like how you move those blue pads.
- 32% to 40%: Although it is a quite fun cube section, that suits the music well, it could get a lot more decoration. Maybe add something above the ground, about 3-4 blocks high so that the player won't touch them? Maybe add some saws to act as air deco? Everything you deem suitable can be added.
- 55% to 62%: Lasers usually appear in a short time but fade out in a long time, so you may want to adjust the alpha triggers to make it look this way. Also, if you want to use lasers, make them long enough so that players don't see the ends of it. If you have rotated the beam and found that it is not long enough, delete it. Copy another straight beam, elongate it, and then rotate it again. It's the hard way, but it will look better.
- 72%: Blunt background end. I'm sure you can work out how to fix them, given that you already did basically the same thing at 12% to 16%. Also, the block outline and the background are the same colour, again making the layout hard to read.
- 86% to 94%: Learn how the 'bar graph' works before trying to mimic it. They go up to the top in quick speed and returns to original height slowly. If you need help, just go on Monstercat and they have that 'bar graph' on every music video they publish.
- 94%: Making text spin is really ugly. Don't do that, please.
- You frequently used sort of an outline block that is just hollow. That is really ugly because they look like blocks just stacked on top of each other. What does that suggests? A grid?
- That leads me to another point. Give your design a theme, or a meaning. Perhaps you are making red vs blue? How can you make a contrast between these two colours that doesn't looks odd? How about less saturation, slightly tweaking the hue, or upping the brightness? Design every deco around what you are trying to build, whether it's vaporwave, or just simply glow. It makes the level more coherent, and I think it is something that will serve the level well. Unfortunately, only a few people is actually doing it, and even famous creators fail on this.
Triggers
You have used triggers, but I think that is not enough. You can integrate much more triggers into both your gameplay and decoration, either by moving platforms, custom rotating objects, vertically moving background, so on, so forth. Just experiment. Throw science at the wall and see what sticks.
Verdict
Needs Improvement. While I do think the gameplay is decently enough to maybe a rated standard, the deco simply cannot make it. However, I see a lot of potential in your work, especially on creating effects. Just try and see how far can you go. Dedicate time and push your limits. You can do much much better than this. I promise.
>>> Moving to NI.
PS I once again wrote over 1300 words