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You can make infinite money without in-game time passing by buying a "scarce" item, making it go "critical", then selling it back, repeatedly.

The grains are the seeds.

It's charming. I played to what I guess is the end of the demo. My main criticism so far is that the energy system is painfully opaque. It is very unclear what the practical impact of any of the energy-related upgrades is.

I beat the game only ever putting points into luck. It seemed much more relevant to progression than corral size. I finished with 7/10 luck because towards the end I stopped prestiging since it didn't seem like it would get me back where I was quickly enough to be worth anything. And I suppose I got moderately lucky to get all the colours in the last two corrals in one try.

You should not incentivise players to farm levels they have already beaten. In fact I wouldn't even allow it. Instead you should make sure the first part of the next level is doable and rewarding for players who did the entire previous level. Rewards don't seem to go up at all with missions, which is odd.

For me it doesn't really matter what the game has you build there, as long as it challenges you to acquire the space for it. But if you want brainstorming: a large crafting station. A large harpoon gun to catch some objects farther out. A fast travel station (human cannon?). A wind turbine energy source. A drill that mines the cliff. I do like the idea of some special plant requiring the space, too.

The idea being any of these would be required for progression. Except maybe the fast travel, which players would build regardless.

This is a very charming, fresh take on an existing concept.

Here are my criticisms:

The start seemed glitchy. I had one soul but had to go get another just to feed the tree its first one.

The pacing was awkward. Early game I had to do several runs without any upgrades that change how the run goes. Late game I could buy my way through several levels of a newly unlocked artifact.

The first round of artifacts only give you economy bonuses, which at that point don't let you buy anything except economy bonuses.

The Dark Cemetery, for me, performed just a little bit worse than the Enchanted Forest, all game long.

The plant growing aspect was unintuitive, with the plants fruiting then wilting, unharvested, while I wasn't even looking at them. And now that I did figure it out, it seems like it is not useful at all. Even if harvesting always worked, you have to waste valuable time in a run collecting plant seeds.

If holding E to deposit as many souls as possible was explained, I missed it. Holding E to gradually deposit many over time would be more intuitive anyway.

Maybe this is a nitpick but I think the tutorial signs damage the charming atmosphere.

Maybe I am easily entertained when it comes to sandbox building games, but I thought this twist was quite cool.

Here's where I would take it:

Have interesting features on the cliff, like little ledges, small hollows, interesting plants or abandoned structures. Some could be hidden from view at first by the geometry of the cliff.

Lean into a global grid, so pre-existing features can be placed grid-aligned where desired.

Play with the structural side of it, like including some rare, finite elements like beams (player-placed or pre-constructed) that allow an occasional larger area or longer reach away from the cliff. Come up with a way that that matters. If you really wanted to play with it, you could introduce support cables.

Remove repairing as a concept. Structures can be either invulnerable or just die if an enemy attacking it is ignored for too long. Or they could self-repair or something. Repairing is not fun.

Alternatively, maybe enemies could go for key infrastructural elements, which the player has some reason to protect. Repairing would be limited to those.