Wow, thanks a lot for your comment!
As you have noted, sound effects and ambience have been a bit of an afterthought compared to the rest, we did spend some time on it but it was late in the jam.
Regarding difficulty, it is very heartening to hear that you want to stick with it despite being stuck! We have struggled a lot with tuning the hints and explanations on how to progress, there was one playtesting session where I had almost given up hope that this would work at all.
Thanks again, your comment means a lot to us!