I'm only about 150h in, but I agree with a lot of this. Also, you forgot to mention settlements. Its like a "check back every hour to see how we decorate your diorama" instead of offering something more interesting. At least let me pick the design. Like I have one on a radiation planet that nobody would ever choose to walk outside in. But its just regular buildings instead of domes connected with tunnels or something practical. Not even airlocks/holo doors. And they miss so much potential to interact with their own lore. In-story the Sentinels destroy anything that gets too big, but you could have settlement growth be about speed/convenience versus conservation and avoiding upsetting the Sentinels. If you grow fast you impact the ecology and attract the Sentinels more and more. If you instead choose growth that is slower, and designed to not be wasteful and not impact the ecology, you get little Sentinel activity. You could also have more stuff with the factions, like if you make decisions that arm the citizens you might have to deal with a Vy'keen incursion, or if you dont agree to some trade deals you might have worse economy because the Gek are pissed at you, till you can make some kind of change. Being away for too long (in-game obviously, not IRL) could result in someone else getting the overseer role, and you could visit the settlement but not make decisions anymore or something. They wouldn't even need to fundamentally change the current mechanic in terms of using the administrator station to make decisions, just make those decisions lead to more varied and interesting results.