Yeah that part was a little odd. If I did it again I would put in a replay button, since closing and reopening works like you said.

True.  It only takes one hit for the spacebar to be detected, but the game is more about learning and thinking ahead to how long it will take for the input to go through.  If this were a "proper" game, I would do what you mentioned, but for the jam I was more interested with what I could do under this self-imposed technical limitation.

Thank you for playing and commenting though, I really appreciate it!