S0fted, Incremental games are meant to offer strategic gameplay..
While the use of power-ramping to overcome seemingly impossible obstacles is what attracts players into the power fantasy; the point is for the player to feel like their outcome was dependent upon their own agency and skill in some way to reach effective outcomes that reflect on the personality of the player.
Memorable games are built on the promise that the gameplay stories of each player is part of the 'world' of the game. The synth music seemed to begin to elicit this with the thematic cyberpunk techno-futurism. Would be nice to see what happened to that debit the player was supposed to owe early on in the game. There are other mining games which follow a similar theme, so there's a bunch of resources for players to draw from to feel familiarity with.
All-in-all... a good start for a game design, but AI-augmented development (as I suspect this release is) cannot and must not be the only source of what it takes to ship good product.
ps: Even Cookie Clicker has a greater freedom of player-based choice (holding out on upgrading now for a small boost vs. upgrading later for a bigger boost and trying to decide which is the better choice overall), and storyline (as with the true origin of the 'grandmothers').
p.ps: Just to reitterate. I mentioned 'choice', not difficulty. As choice is the way to bring in Player Agency. Grinding is like sugar. Addictive yet sameish. I believe you have the opportunity to shape this into something greater. To craft an experience that makes players want to come back for reasons other than 'progression'.