Wow, this was a pretty interesting game! The vibes given off by the combination of the immaculate art, music, and story were fantastic and made quite the impression on me: everything just had an air of intoxicating mystique that made me want to play more to figure out what's going on. When it wasn't the atmosphere, it was the puzzles that had my interest as well: the game kept introducing new mechanics at a steady pace, and the way puzzles can get messy which makes you improvise was rather unique. The little touches like rest stops, hidden lore, and other secrets added a lot as well. Really cool stuff!
I have to admit, though, that as cool as the game was, there was something about it that made me not as compelled to keep playing as I thought I would be. Don't get me wrong, I still like it, but I didn't like it as much as I thought I should've based on how good it looked...if that makes any sense. I can think of 2 things that might be contributing to this, but in truth it might be something else altogether I lack the ability to describe. Nonetheless, the two factors I can think of are:
One would be the fact that it's very easy to put this game into the ever-growing pile of other 'artsy' indie games, the ones that are all so moody and depressing and contemplative and mysterious. It's not necessarily fair, but there's just so many of these that one can become dull to it and think that many of them are style-over-substance, that the reward for trying to keep track of all this hidden lore and meaning will not be worth all the hassle. I just don't think that this game has some sort of special quality, some hook, some elevator pitch that makes it stand out amongst the crowd. I know I'm sounding like a pretentious git right now, and I don't think it's necessarily the case with this game, but it's just what happens when you become a jaded old one like me. I dunno, maybe I'm being overly harsh because you're putting it on Steam and I think that means I should be more critical.
The other factor is that the game gives off a very puzzle game impression, but due to the action mechanics like tracking enemies and shooting projectiles, the solutions to the puzzles in this game are not easily reproducible: one minor adjustment to the way you move, one degree of difference between how you shoot, and suddenly you've butterfly-effected your attempted puzzle solution into an unrecognizable state and you're lost. Now, one could argue that this is actually a unique merit to the game: indeed, some of the ways that I've improvised myself out of a messy situation live in my mind as noteworthy achievements, more so than a regular solution would. But on the other hand, it can suck when you know what you want to do but you flub the execution in minor ways and lose, especially when there is a lot of pre-setup that you have to re-do which is the case for some levels. The common refrain would be that I've already had the eureka moment and now the game is wasting my time! In addition to this, certain elements like the deadly trails that enemies or bombs give off can be so annoying, especially when again, you try to execute cutting through them right when they're fading but time it wrong.
Anyway, I do believe you have something special here and I look forward to seeing the release on Steam. Best of luck!