Hello, I just released my first game 2 days ago and sponsored it for 2 days. The Average Playtime my game have is 5 min, and D1 Retention is 2.5%. I noticed alot of players dropped on “Upgrade Machine” step in my game, I made it so when player is in tutorial they have 2x money boost.
What should I do to improve Average Playtime & D1 Retention?
The game is not that bad but my first suggestion would be to turn down the music, or add a setting for that because it is really loud.
Also for some reason the plastic table keeps the proximity prompt even after repairing it and setting it out. 
Noted, there is settings to mute music after the tutorial is done, but I will turn down the music. Thank you!
Wellllllllll
I found out why most people probrably leave…
So what heppened was after upgrading the machine the tutorial sort of gets stuck. It just says “Collect 1000 money” But I am at 10K and it still is not telling me what to do next.
There we go! I finished the tutorial. But yeah that is probrably why people leave because it stops helping you once you finish that step so I kinda had to mess around and I assigned my worker but if you are targeting a younger audience then they will most likely just leave.
Also I would suggest making it to where you can see what you are earning from the playtime reward!
After the Upgrade Machine player still need to collect 1000 money to buy repairman and assign it. Maybe I should add more information to the tutorial text?
Yes so once the upgrade they need to gain another 1000 money but it does not tell you what to do with the money after collecting it like how having an arrow to show you where to go, I suggest adding some sort of pulse effect or something on the gui and it tells you to do this and that.
I added pulse effect to the Repairman button for that step, also for assigning the repairman. Is the pulse not showing to you?
Yeah I never had a pulsing effect for the assign button, but I think I had some sort of black pulse on the repairman button but I clicked on it without noticing and it went away 
Maybe add a text that tells you to “Go assign a worker” or something.
Alright, maybe that’s a bug I don’t notice, I’ll look into it. And thank you for the tutorial text suggestion
Can confirm the 1000/1000 money bug.
I quite liked the game, it reminds me of those mobile ads lol. I think the tutorial should extend to buying your first repairman since that’s never explained (and it took me a while to figure that out myself. Overall the game has a very simple game-loop which may be why it’s not as engaging. You’re basically just spamming E and F the entire time. Think about making repairing items a mini-game, adding a box opening animation with flickering possibilities, etc etc. It will probably affect the pace of your game and require some re-balancing (to ensure progression doesn’t suddenly feel really slow) but it’s worth thinking about.
Also, the progression seems to jump from really fast to quite slow very quickly since the upgrades go from 1k → 25k straight away. I think you should add an intermediate upgrade, 5k, for the machine, repairman etc. That will probably help with retention after the first machine upgrade.
I think a stronger theme for the game would be nice. A Christmas version of this game where you get are an elf and get toy part crates, make toys and add them to a massive gift sack in exchange for coins could work well for example (obviously release late november). As cringe as it is some kind of trend theme could also work well.
Another quick bug I found: upgrading the machine causes a box to stay at the end of the conveyor which is impossible to open, basically taking up box storage
I realised that the tutorial wasn’t broken but was in fact trying to highlight the repairman UI. In which case, make it MUCH more obvious where the player is supposed to click in the tutorial (bright red highlights, arrows etc).
These are really good suggestions. I’ll look more to remake the progression balancing to boost player retention.
I’ll think more to make game mechanics like repairing items minigame when you don’t have repairman assigned, etc.
For bug I can’t believe my friends missed that box bug while testing.
Thank you so much for these suggestions, these will help alot!
The animations feel choppy, which makes me wonder if they’re being handled on the client or on the server. Another small but noticeable issue is that text labels on plots don’t reset once a player leaves and the plot becomes empty.
The tutorial functions, but it doesn’t feel very engaging and it makes learning the mechanics at the start a bit difficult. On top of that, progression slows down too much after a certain amount of time, which makes the gameplay feel boring rather than rewarding. New upgrades are very expensive and don’t give much value as you don’t get much profit from investing into them.
I also recommend improving the UI backgrounds and visual effects. At the moment, both feel quite basic and don’t provide much sense of satisfaction or visual appeal. Consider improving the lighting too.
Your game icon and thumbnails are very well done, and the UI icons also look polished and visually appealing.
Overall, the release feels rushed. Launching in this state may have cost you money on ads rather than helping. I’d recommend fixing the bugs, polishing the experience, and making the gameplay loop more satisfying and engaging, because the game itself really does have strong potential.
After rejoining, the repairman disappears and you need to click the assign button again for him to reappear.
Additionally, the coins gained from selling move very quickly, and the effect doesn’t feel impactful. They also don’t face the player, which makes the visual less engaging - it would look much better if they rotated or had some kind of spinning animation as they move.
Consider adding particle effects that emit from the player when collecting coins or dropped items. This would make the interaction feel more rewarding and visually engaging.
