Did you look at the noctis help html file? The game isn't intuitive, it takes a few minutes to figure out. But once you set down on a planet and look up at the 2 suns it's incredible.
Watching an alien sunrise is incredible.
Look
here for a list of all my topics in gamedev's forums. Look for the ones talking about space. (I started this project in June 2004).
Direct3D is supposed to be powerful, not inuitive. It still looks like gibberish to me. OpenGL is a little better, but makes my head hurt too.
My game would've had a deemphasis on combat, emphasizing on exploration. There just aren't any games that are about exploration anymore.
7 cities of gold is the last game I can find that touches on the topic, and that's so old its not even funny.