I think you may have been playing the previous version, at the moment if you press Esc it takes you to an options menu. Did you download the game a few days ago?
As for making it restart if one player died, I had originally thought that might be jarring to the other player. However I'm hearing most people express a similar opinion to you on the issue. So I will change it so it restarts after a second or two.
Thanks so much for playing the game and for the feedback! It really does help out a huge amount :)