Is it possible as a beginner that you want the game to progress faster than it supposed to be?
You can use the public player to skip the time-line ahead one year at a time, if that's what you want. Otherwise, it's just fast forward in single-player you can use.
Progress faster in what way?
Playing pak64 in the 1870s (or even earlier) is in some ways like watching paint dry, but perhaps not in the way you mean. In other areas it progresses as fast as anytime else, which sort of means you need to apply another stroke, but the former stroke hasn't dried yet so to speak.