So much feedback! Thanks!
It was actually a "pass the game" jam where the next person continues to work on the game, I was 3rd. It made it into day 6 (last) of the jam and many people decided to build upon my version so now theres a few "final" Octaliens. Here's a cool website showing how all games branched and Octalien being the biggest one https://vykri.com/pass-the-game-2023/
You can play all of them here https://itch.io/jam/day-6/entries
Some may fix your issues, some may not ;)