If you collect enough Wormhole artifacts, you can jump to the last galaxy right at the start - summon a trader or two with the trader artifact, and use scanner artifact to breeze through the last galaxy.
Really fantastic game, am playing for a couple of days too now and love it, but the wormholes don't work that well for me ... I use them, and then got stuck twice already when I did a jump which gets me back into the first galaxy, but can't fly back because the gate back is still locked. Just right now it was the first jump I did, so seems a bit like russian roulette with pressing the trigger 5 times if I want to explore more galaxies after the use of a wormhole. Am using FC III+ to get anywhere.
Also if I would jump into the last galaxy straight from the beginning I guess I would just be cannon fodder for the enemies there, since I wouldn't have a shield yet or anything else, wouldn't I?. Also the Traders are a bit irregular, I went all the way to the 4th galaxy, and checked every single waypoint, without finding a single trader, so had a bunch of cash but couldn't use it. Luckily I've found at least a basic shield by then in some loot, wouldn't have made it otherwise.
This sounds a bit negative, but in fact I'm loving the game, and enjoy it! Just saying in its current format I wouldn't be able to progress without a Freezer.
Sorry for this late comment but I just wrote a review of this game so I played I thouroughly (and initially fell into the same mistake as you did)
If you're using a freezer you're playing the game the wrong way! You see, in GoTA death is not so much a setback as an opportunity, and the process of dying and restarting with the code is in fact necessary to progress, as every time you do so the game gets easier thanks to the artifacts and credits you amass. It would take a ridiculous amount of time to do it in one go, if that's possible at all.