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I have been having a think about what you could do to urge the player to explore, maybe add a little bit of information about each planet, for example so a planet was made up mostly of magma so you would buy rocks/coal from them at a super cheap price due to the planet being saturated with it, then go across to a cold planet to sell the goods that they themselves can't produce. You could have lots of planet with different specialisations and stats for other things.

Music wise again this could either be set to each style of planet to keep up the atmosphere or you could go down the Sim City route and have lift style lounge music in the background. Just a few thoughts.

I think the Sim City suggestion about the music put me on the right track, thanks. 

In regards to the exploration problem, it's just that I want the game to have a few surprises up its sleve so the player would seriously start to wonder about the possibilities/scope of the game. Trading isn't really something that gets most people excited, and there's the fact that there practically exists an infinite amount of planets due to the psuedorandom generation the game uses, everything just starts to feel samey, regardless of how far you travel.

I was planning to recycle the engine and to use it with a theming that allows me to add unique content that fits the game more easily, and encourages exporation in a way that makes sense in context of the game world.

Sounds good to me! Maybe create a LORE for the game in a similar vain to No Man's Sky with different races and a history to uncover.