Thanks, but yeah made a timer and then when we were playing we had no time to make an easy mode so we decided to scrap it. We wanted the game to be finishable by everyone and putting a timer where you get restarted from the beginning when 1 out of 4 people can take 30+ minutes to clear the last section felt a little off-putting for us.
A lot more time was spent on testing the game, making sure the third section was hard enough. That way most people won't get it on their first try but looked clearable and also hard enough that it gets you to learn deeper about your movement if you took the right route. Or the falling acceleration and attack frame if you took the left route.
The level designer and I wanted more freedom to the player to learn and play or just close the game haha...
by the end of it all maybe the theme was just how much time/patience are you willing to give to actually try and finish this game? when you've already tried for 20 minutes and still stuck at the final checkpoint while thinking I got this next time.