I learned that sometimes less is more: I normally always created a few high-energy, looping tracks for my games - but this time opted for just a few chords with enough breathing room in between and a bigger focus on making the SFX sound good (adaptive spinning noise depending on strength, a rope stretching sound as feedback for some of the movements, ...). I feel like this was such an important choice for our game, which is quite hard and can be played for 10+ minutes if someone tries to 100% complete it.
Another thing I learned: scaling the volume + pitch of a looping audio depending on some gameplay / user input factors really ties everything together!
If anyone wants to check it out: https://grumelkeks.itch.io/coptercap