We wanted to make the pace a little slower indeed it felt more right!
You were the only one who got the chance to actually playtest it, we planned to have much more people trying the game because of the level design but your feedback was very important!
You can do a lot of different things with this mechanic yes but the hardest part is again the level design, which again needs some playtesting to improve! ^^
Thanks, and I'm glad you liked the end, it was added in a rush!