I still think about this section all the damn time. Such a cool part.Hell, I would take an entire hack based around the snakey block/P-switch section of the ultimate level, it was incredibly cool.
Anyway, congrats on the clear! I'm really glad you stuck it out to the final levels, because I knew you'd like them. For what it's worth, you're not the only one who felt that way about the hack (I remember someone left a comment on the original SMW Central listing saying as much). Either way, I hope you enjoyed your time with it and I'm looking forward to seeing what you pick up next.
I had something bizarre happen in one of the background songs of Peachy Moat World, and I'm wondering if either of you might know why. So in the Ultra Star level, they used a sweet Hooded Edge port of a Sonic & Knuckles 3 track that appears in a bunch of hacks, specifically this one:
That should autoplay at 28:29, but if not, that's the tune. It was mostly fine, but the weird thing is that when the main theme repeated (as it does around 29:39), it would play in a completely different key than the background chords. It's like one of them was a half-step higher than the other, but only for that specific section. The rest of the song was fine. It was absolutely baffling, and more than a little distracting. What could even cause this? It's my understanding that SPCs can't play other notes beyond what's written in their text files. It wasn't even solved by rebooting the console, as I played half the level (plus secret exit) yesterday, and the second half today. It's fine in the Youtube video above and in the song's listing on SMW Central too.
As for the game itself, I'm getting closer to the credits. Right now I'm at 26.5 exits, halfway through the moon physics level. While I still find this mechanic to be the kind of chocolate I absolutely hate (let me play Mario! Don't change the basic rules!), I will begrudingly admit that at least the first half wasn't as bad as I feared. The setups are pretty readable and not super tight, with the exception of the two falling shell jumps you have to do. Once I figured out how to do them they weren't so bad -- you have to keep moving to the right after you throw, unlike a regular shell jump where you typically need to maintain your X position, but at no point does the level actually tell you that. I had to do a lot of trial and error, ultimately watching someone else's clear video to put the pieces together. Hopefully the second half sticks to a similar difficulty level. After that, I've just got two exits left (though the final level is long enough to be two by itself). I was on vacation this past week and I'm back to work tomorrow, but I should be able to wrap the whole thing up before the week's out.