I haven't played them since I found this forum but found them pretty fun before. You have to thoroughly know the "payout" structure of each step and play accordingly. I made it to step 4 a couple times but could never get over the hump and into step 5. Think of the whole thing as a $6 tourney. Don't think of the different level buyins.

It's kind of like a MTT in that you can put in a lot of work only to usually bust out. It really sucks to work your way up to level 4 only to bust all the way back down when AA gets cracked in Level 1 or something.