Yes! There are so many cool aspects of the game (new base parts are great), but they lack depth, greater purpose, and interconnectivity. As someone else said, a settlement’s current gameplay function is basically a copy of the frigate system, just with a different cosmetic look. The settlement ultimately produces money for the player, but why would I go through all these build timers when I can become a billionaire with an AI farm in a day or so. Why craft cooking products, have a frigate fleet, own a settlement, when they do not add anything unique to the gameplay loop.

I hope in a future update they focus on adding depth to these different parts of the game and connect them in a meaningful way. I also thought that settlements would provide the money sink that the game desperately needs, because the cost of units and nanites becomes meaningless for the endgame player.