This game definitely stood out the most for me in the bunch. I got nostalgic about my time doing a game design degree in uni and our lecturer took us to a small indie art museum where people were presenting really out-there stuff that challenged a lot of design norms and played with the idea of what is an experience and are games art.
This game has the most 'art' both literally and figuratively out of all of these, and I really loved experiencing this and I could tell that everyone's experience of it would be quite different.
I think you can lean even more into telling the player that this is not a typical game, and when things are confusing or don't make sense, what matters is that the player relaxes; there's no timers, no danger, nothing to oppose them except their own need for answers. But yeah maybe explain hope and inspiration a little more (i.e. hope can be thought of as 'money' to purchase creatures or 'upgrades', etc.)
I agree a little with the comment about art style not matching, but I personally think the textures are fine and it was just the colour that maybe needed to be aligned a little more so it didn't look like an alien island ;) (unless that's what you were going for)