Great game! my partner likes this game the most out of what she has played, she liked the tension the circle brought. I believe having some tense music as the circle gets close to you, would highly improve the overall feel of the game.
It did lag for me quiet a lot, and i ended up personally repeating it 6 times with only cutting maybe 1-3 trees each route. i believe reducing the amount of empty spaces by lets say 70% and replacing it with rock (cant cut through) would force me to use the axe and not just find a simple path.
But, all in all, great game!