I think that's also a big step, yeah. Don't robopops already eat energy instead of food though?
I would like to see different governments be significantly mechanically different though. Something like Communist-type governments being best for building up a lot of industry really fast, but being not great at research and being prone to factional infighting; Autocratic governments are great at all kinds of war, but are god-awful at managing morale and have a lot of potential for rebellions; and Democracies are good at being stable and happy, but can't fight offensive wars without huge maluses and are subject to the whims of their people. Then all the governments in the game right now can be arranged somewhere on that triangle.
Then there's a strategic layer to picking and sticking with a government type. Should you start autocratic and then try to move to a more egalitarian or communal government later? That would do fine in getting you a big empire, but maybe the recently conquered pops don't feel culturally in tune with your people and try to secede, or they outbreed your home pops and take over your empire. Stuff like that.
Then have the premade races get more character and be almost certain to show up if the little box is checked. I always play with the premade races on, but they hardly ever show, even when I let the AI spawn in non-primitive races (I like to play Fermi Paradox a lot). They could carry a lot of flavor if they had unique lines, special AI or traits, stuff like that.
Although speaking of Fermi Paradox, I'd love to see a DLC dedicated to mechanics and systems designed to make the game fun even for a player in an empty galaxy. Better primitives, more and better colonizing rules, special events to fracture particularly large empires, that sort of thing.