The first game plays so much better than the 2nd! Never finished the 2nd game, now that I think about it.
Another thing that I have a (possibly fake) memory from the 1st game is, near the start, with those carnivorous egg-looking-plants and farting peaches, I remember once managing to get one of those plants to go up right as the peach farted, which triggered a small event and turned the plant into a mini thing-item to collect. Maybe it was only in the demo and scrapped for the full game?