Hey! Really appreciate the very thorough review and totally get your personal criticisms with the game at it's current public version stage. I understand your issues with the card game and it has evolved a little bit over time, with the introduction to consumables that allows players to better swing things into their advantage, and the weather system buffing and debuffing certain card types to give players an incentive to run certain decks over others each in-game season. I'm also currently trying to figure out ways to see if I could implement more systems that give player more information on the field and strategic agency without it being a clear; if x occurs, always do y.
Ultimately, big fans of TCGs would definitely be disappointed at this card game's shallowness and that is the choice I decided to make as that isn't the core area of game that I wanted to put all my energy and resources into. It's simply used as a means of pacing the dating-sim aspect out with a simple gameplay mechanic that everyone could understand and plow through if they so wish.
As for the apps and just what to do in general, we've been adding more and more 'notes' in later updates about what the objectives are meant to be and especially in 0.08, we've added the web app that goes over many questions and aspects of what the different systems in the game are and how they interact with each other. Your point about getting lost in the phone and not knowing what everything does is valid and we will look into adding toggle-able app names and introductory messages on what the app's function is when first opening them.
Thanks for trying the game!