Hi Ethren, thanks for the thoughts - that's definitely been on my mind. The game won't be turning into a run-and-gun action game, blasting all the creatures with lasers or anything.
Have been thinking of ways to have a small mix of creatures, some hostile to add a threat/challenge to exploration, and others as passive (that perhaps can provide you with some benefit/resources in ways other than killing them). And making sure however they're designed makes sense in the generally casual game-play the game has now.
There will definitely be an option to disable the hostile creatures so they just ignore the player.