Games that don't take place in a literal 3d volume (roguelikes primarily) are good candidates for abstract graphics, because it's nearly impossible to represent what's actually happening in graphics. Mainly because it often doesn't make sense (oh, right, five red dragons in a small hallway).
Aurora and Spare Empires also have a lot of abstraction, and meter-for-meter differences aren't very important. In Aurora you can stack hundreds of ships on one point, and it's reasonable. You can design your ships however you see fit and imagine them whatever you like, without having to actually arrange the rooms. (Good luck doing that with engineering spaces, btw.)
For those games, it's not laziness, or an artistic statement; it's merely the only way it can possibly work.
Hazeron needs a fair amount of graphics because there's FPS-style combat, and walking around inside a ship matters: Where are the walls? Where is that door, which might be venting atmosphere? Which windows can I see out of? And BECAUSE you spend a ton of time staring at the graphics, well, you don't want to stare at something ugly.
Also, things like Noctis? Exploring a galaxy full of amazing sights was a huge draw to that game, even if they haven't aged well (and weren't necessarily thrilling to begin with).