So if races are purely cosmetic what the hell is the idea with catching them?
See this is what i hate, this game is too ambitious and they go on compromises at very sad parts.
The best i can see coming out of this is some Knytt style platformer, but with guns and a few figures wich sprites just had their hue randomly alteref. Maybe some spaceship that will let you fly to 3-4 other systems, point-and-click-to-go-there controls. The gameplay will entirely consist of running up and down a hill, kill 2 or 5 monsters with nothing special about them, maybe a randumbly generated jumble of words as their names. Watch some mining animation and walk back to your ship wich will then, after 2 minutes of loading be sent into a boring space backdrop, 2 or 3 other boring planets in view. Point and click in the direction of the menu butto-AHEM space station, waiting 3 minutes because you arent a level 7 douchebag-in-a-cockpit, being put into some boring station interface with 2 or 3 parts animated, like some boring fucking point-and-click game.
Not that my opinions mean shit, but if i would first even remotely think of spending a much as a penny when i have seen a full flegded space gameplay complete with awesome derelict spaceships to explore/loot and astroids to dogde and blow to pieces, newtonian physics and gravity wells, when the planets are rich and with a detailed, simulated ecosystem, awesome ancient cities to explore/getting raped by lovecraftian horrors and Jaffa cakes.
Seriously.