Ok, so the hours I spent playing this last night were for nothing. I had beaten at least 30 levels with stars, I get on today and I have 3 and none of my equipment/skills from last night. Despite the fact that I have the first two badges.
I am guessing that it has something to do with the server it said I was connecting to (on this single-player game). Welp, looks like I'm done with games from Berzerk Studio.
Don't attack enemies that are to your bottom right. You can't hit anything in that quadrant no matter how you position yourself. Huge oversight. Game is cool, but there's a lot of little things that need improvement.
bugggggy. I'm supposed to choose my metal, but I have a hammer instead which I can use to pound the screen an apparently infinite number of times. But there's nothing to pound, although it still leaves a mark and makes a sound. Second bug I've seen, another where it skipped past the painting phase on the shield.
To speed up the game in later levels, go back to your earlier levels (after you have some cash saved there of course, for later transfer) and delete everything and get rid of all of your staff.
It's the "people" that are slowing down the gameplay. When you start running a new city, the old city is still there, plugging away. With all those people running around. But you don't need more than a couple million $ at the older cities to transfer, so just scrap the whole thing as you move forward when you have saved up enough cash. Speeds up the game significantly.
Try to drug the mouse.