From explorers point of view, it's a pity that planets themselves have received so little love in general. I'd take better gas giant and unlandable atmospheric planet texturing over space fungus scanning any day.
NGL, I bought it for the pretty planet. I knew it would be a buggy mess and a content island with a cheap FPS slapped on. And I don't even have that.
Now, I'd like people to carefully watch the steam trailer. Notice how everytime we see a landscape, the star is very low on the horizon. It's always dawn or sunset. A technique used to "blur" the details, and give more depth to a landscape. Makes everything a lot prettier. When it's not dawn/sunset, you get a dude's bottom and can't see much.
The only time they don't, is in very short shot (less than a second), when they attack a base.
Even planet views are more than half in the dark, and very close.
I think they were already fully aware. It didn't come as a surprise.