1. My main emotion was curiosity because after every frame I'd think "what's going to happen next?" or "where is this going?" The background sound definitely made me feel nostalgic, though I can't say I relate to the cross country theme but that's me.
2. I think the limited mechanics actually fit the style of the game very well! It would be hard for me to imaging a game like this with dungeon-crawling elements, in my opinion.
Fantastic work as usual, Em!