In general the wall already got a lot of changes - I would appreciate if You could try giving it some deeper look. Depending on the angle that You drive in it the outcome will be different. Straight into the wall You will be bounced back so You don't have to reverse. If You hit it with the back of Your car or slightly to the side as an accident while drifting for example, You will only lose speed. The only time it really nukes You is when You hit it from the slight angle from the front. I am still thinking on how to make it work, but for now it seemed fair for me. Yet it still might be a subject to change.
Thanks a lot for feedback, the more I know, the less impactful the wall needs to be hahaha
Also I don't feel like I want to force reset on hitting the wall - time challenges would be 100% omitted if that was the case :")
Maybe the jarring effect of the total stop is pronounced, because at least to me, scraping the car's front corner to a wall in a shallow angle is by far the most common way to hit a wall (for example when understeering in a corner) and it also happens to be something you mentioned you're still working on.
At least to me, the expected result of scraping the front corner in a shallow angle would be that the car would bounce back with reduced speed, allowing me to keep accelerating and start thinking about the next corner. I would shrug it off and think, "oh well, that's going to make my time a bit worse, but I can't wallow in it, since the next corner is already coming up". I would still be engaged with the action. Now if the car even slightly brushes a wall, the flow stops, and my attention shifts from the fun stuff to my mistake, and I have to slowly get the car going again.
But these were just my thoughts on the importance of the "flow". The important thing is that you get it to a point where YOU'RE happy with it. Hope this was of some help anyway :P