The watermelon movement seemed pretty unbalanced in the players favor depending on the the computer running it.
Likely not using delta time for the speed values I'd imagine? Not much of a coder myself yet, but I know that can cause issues.
The idea is neat though, I doubt there was anything like this made back in the day.
The timer seems much too long currently.
Maybe if the melon had more options, like a dash that recharged over time, or had limited uses, the balance would be better.
It's hard to say, since the speed can vary so much from machine to machine what the intended game feel was when it was made.