Hoo that is GREAT! My little dreams (to share this casual game with friends!) are becoming a reality! Good luck with the fun/job! ₍ᐢ•ﻌ•ᐢ₎
Here is a free idea: a crashed octopus friend on the moon that give you little quests to fulfill (like a NPC) in order to have chosen rewards (like an item apart from the tech-tree, or deep in it) to spice up the gameplay. ʕ♡ᴥ♡ʔ
[=> Mine me 15 uranium and you can choose between a crystal lamp, 20 hearty meal OR an auto-crafter! something like that! lol
[get me 25 scraps and you can haz 3 orange-tree seeds, 9 uranium OR a paintbrush to customise the color of modules!]
[get me 5 grilled steaks/artefacts, and i would give you a free air-tank every day here, a better scrap conversion of 2 to 1 iron here, or a free chocolate speed boost bar every day!] ... something to iron out some bottleneck in the gameplay so.
It could even be a way to collect all random artefacts purposefully (to get it out of the planet as a second goal to the game for hard fans) to drag the story after completing all of it for the cat (like i do often) and use current vehicle and bases for a wider purpose (it is hard to do with random luck each time we scan an artefact to complete them all!).
The fun could be real! (basically it gives something to do purposefully apart & after the main mission; the octopuss [get it?!] friend could have a story and a mission too, and you help it get it done along with you! (for easy added hours of gameplay!)