Sure! I think it's primarily because I'm a bit dumb, but if I were to try and make it easier for dummies like me, I'd maybe give the player a little time to get a bit of a head-start.
What I mean by that is, I think if I'd have had a short period of time to explore the controls, try all the buttons, and really get a feel for the flow of the game - knowing when is a good time to try and sabotage, or when you absolutely need to sell a resource to progress. Some of that I learned essentially as I was trying to catch up.
I think if I just had that moment to experiment a little, I'd have been able to do a better job of keeping pace with the AI.
While I'm thinking about it, I'm going to try again and see if there's anything else that stuck out to me.