@pixelshenanigans I've experimented with this genre a bit and my takeaway was that the player needs two things to keep playing:

1) A constant feeling of progress. ( More coins, more cookies, more kittens, whatever)

2) The promise of something bigger and different. For example, if your game sells upgrades, then the upgrades should have bespoke (unpredictable) changes to the game, and some of them should be locked out with no details available until the player has satisfied the requirements to unlock them. This promise that they can get something bigger and different is core to the player's motivation.

@maxim

Nifty!

@ZwodahS

Hi ZwodahS,
Also not-an-artist here, but in my experience good design (UI or otherwise) is a matter of matching functionality to user intuition. Looking at a screenshot, it's hard to say what's intuitive and what's not, especially without context of what it does.

My suggestion would be to present your UI to someone and ask them to perform a few tasks with the UI. Watch what they try to do -- this tells you what they find intuitive. Watch what they don't try -- this tells you what is unintuitive.

Run this experiment with several people and try to pick out common themes. Then make adjustments and ask for more feedback.

I hope this helps, and good luck!

@gameboyscene

I love the contrast in that after pic.