You got that right about the tutorial. Under time crunch, we really struggled with "what's the fastest and easiest way we can give the player the information they need to get started?" The game could have benefitted from more time given to developing a tutorial. Then again, the towers needed tuning too. Hard to know where best to put efforts.
If it's any consolation, you've landed on the same strategy I use. But I've never actually beaten the game in its current form. Best I can do is 700 Ichor.
Thanks for your comments. It's good feedback!
Seems like the game might be too difficult or too frantic in its current state, or the difficulty ramp is too steep. We didn't intend it to have "Foddian" level of difficulty, like "Getting over it", but that's what we ended up with. If we continue to work on it, we might be able to smooth out the difficulty curve and build a better onboarding experience. But I don't really know if there's an appetite for this type of game.
Thanks again!