The game is good but the progression is very slow. Takes like a month of everyday play to make a sizable chunk of progress. The game systems are good though but item drops seem a bit low and raising stats to the required amount would take forever.
While I agree it does take quite a while to make progress at points once you break that wall it's usually free to go for another area or two. Also some people are into that sort of game, I mean if we progressed so fast that we caught up to every update right away people would complain about that too.
It's about making incremental gains. Basically, set your slider to probably half (in the Awakening Area) and awaken maybe every time you gain 10% (stats) from what it was last Awakening. This will make quicker awakenings but the growth is steady. As for items, most are trash at the low tiers. I would say hold onto anything that lets you 1-shot people in the area you are working on the highest level (eternal foundry 1 for me, 2 isn't sustainable).
Also, buy the item filter and when you go away, filter anything not mythical. Also buy the auto combine. The unique area items need to be destroyed to level 100 so you get the bonus