[Kamaeru]

I see your point about it being a bigger space than the player needs to walk around in.
But, level tiles are ultimately to be put together to create a level (duh), which has two functions:

1) Playing in

2) Looking at

And both are important. Nintendo developers at EAD would chuckle at your ideas of minimizing level size for purposes of functionality, and the main reason is that your tiny functional levels take up a fraction of the screen and don't give you anything to look at or potentially explore unknown secrets.

I understand that content density is what you're going for, but content density does not mean leave most of the level black.

(this is directed at Crow)

This guy's levels are the jam and you guys are just jealous.