Got a kick out of this! I would love to play more if you find the mechanic works with more complicated level layouts. I'll stay away from the spoilers, but the area just before the finish suggests to me that there is more to explore with the mechanic. One unrelated idea is to linger on the death/collision frame for a split second, or require a button press, before resetting to the last checkpoint, so the player can see how close they were to navigating successfully.
Thanks!