Turns out I liked the game only because of what I thought the game could be instead of what it actually was.

I never played Star Citizen, but this is kinda where I ended up with No Man's Sky. I played it at launch and again earlier this year and there's definitely some fun to be had but nothing fits together right, or feels fully realized. NMS lost a coherent vision of the game at some point and eventually it just made me itch to play better games that were more focused.