Not sure why the game stopped letting you go forward; if there were no arrows on a level that sounds like a bug.

I do think your confusion points to a small issue I have with the game — I think a ‘high score game’ should usually strive to be quite a bit shorter than this game. This is so that (1) people more quickly see and understand the end-game — that they will end up on a high score chart, (2) so that people are more likely to say, ‘I have time to try that again and do better,’ and (3) so that the story of one ‘match’ can fit in memory, so that people will say, ‘I remember the times when I was suboptimal, if I play again I can try this and that and do better.’

… although, the fact that I will only actually play the game once does match my perception of perfectionism. I’m left with my 108 standing atop a mountain of zeros, wondering, “so, did I do well?”

For that matter, when I went all the way back to the first level, the game stopped letting me go forward again.