I can’t remember much of how Starfield was marketed but I remember the “1000 planets” thing being parroted a lot. Was the fact that these planets were going to be realistically portrayed and mostly empty wastelands something that was made clear during marketing?
They said that about 10% of planets would have life, and that one of the things they wanted to portray was an IRL astronaut's quote of being in space as "magnificent desolation."