"hey guys lets design some cool procgen universe with some custom procgen tech we made (which is awesome btw, not trying to say it isn't), and then build a boring, repetitive game out of it!"
they could have AT LEAST made a procgen quest system like starbound, and it would have added SO MUCH.
i can easily name some things that this game could have had to make it better: procgen quests (as stated earlier), no traders on every planet, better "survival", a population variable for galaxies, star systems and planets, cities, multiplayer (one where you can actually see the other person), more variation in planets (from what i've seen its basically the same thing with different colors, and maybe an ocean planet. maybe do a "percentage mapping" for the random ranges of variables, so that most planets have a normal "noise" value, but there are a few outliers with very noisy terrain, of course the further out the normal range the less percent there is for this to happen
tldr procgen quests, better survival, mp that works and doesnt suck, better terrain detail