This idea reminds me of the Go+ language (https://goplus.org/ https://goplus.org/), which is kind of what you're proposing. But instead of reducing the language

This idea reminds me of the Go+ language (https://goplus.org/ https://goplus.org/), which is kind of what you're proposing. But instead of reducing the language, they just "added less"! I think they were inspired by C++, but decided one "plus" to the language was enough. Maybe the "pluses" add exponential complexity, and C++ hasn't reached the end of its second plus stage yet. /jk