Yeah game is about balancing production with retrieval/runners, but atm runners can really start underperforming, especially late game after level 40+ since the game isn't at all "balanced" for endless mode yet. I will be adding new ways to upgrade and protect runners, as well as two new units that collect ore. Should help a lot with keeping up with production.
I believe the issue with rhino/gorilla upgrades wasn't in GUI issue, but a bug I found where the display of cost numbers was wrong. This will be fixed in the next patch so thanks for reporting.
I agree with your points on prestige. I'll be adding and adjusting early prestige upgrades to make the early game faster/better. Runners will also get more prestige upgrades such as starting with more runners and increasing their speed/capacity.
I think I might have a solution for making Gorilla Arms behave better and it will probably be ready in today's patch.
I'll for sure be making runners better early, but I'll also add some prestige upgrades that make ore clicking better. As for the auto-pausing when alt-tabbed, I hate that so much but it seems it cannot be disabled, so I suggest playing on the desktop client.
Thanks a bunch for your feedback!