After thinking about this long and hard, I’ve finally figured out the one over-arching aspect of Star Control 2 that tied all other aspects of it together and made it work.  Also, the absence of this is one of the main diminishing factors of SC3 (which I enjoyed well enough, mind you.).  It is this:

In Star Control 2, you were an intruder, a stranger everywhere you went!

(Unzervault in the prologue was the only exception, and will be tossed out of my discussion for practical purposes.)

When the game starts, you are not on Earth.  You, as a player, have to discover Earth!  You get nothing at the beginning!  This was brilliant!  From then on, 99.999999% of the map was discovery.  There wasn’t anything to take for granted.  Humans had no “friendly territory.” When I first left Unzervault, I thought, “Okay! I’m going to Earth. I’ll get some supplies, resources, and guidance there…hey wait, why is it red?  Where’s Earth?”  The only thing I thought I knew about this game after opening the box was that I was going to play a human, and if there’s one thing Humans have, it’s Earth.  10 minutes into the game, that was denied me.  It kicked my legs out from under me and in one fell swoop, that decision made the whole universe irreversibly bigger, darker, lonelier, and scarier – AND BETTER!  That tone managed to persist throughout the rest of the game for me, despite the humorous interludes.  The humor was doubly well received because of the loneliness of the rest of the universe to me!

Everywhere you went in SC2 you had to work to fit in or be accepted.  Even Luna, our own moon, had story, mystery, and complication to it.  I knew I couldn’t take ANYTHING for granted in this game.  Every species that I met later in the game had complicated needs and stories.  No friendship was easy to gain.  Even natural friends like the Mmrnmhrm and Syreen were inescapably prevented from helping me in the ways I needed.  That design choice helped me as a player to square my shoulders and work hard.  I knew the galaxy would give me nothing, NOTHING! So I became better, craftier, and more thorough in my playing.  THAT is why SC2 stands out in my mind after so many years.

The list of human intrusions in SC2 goes on…

In Androsynth space, you’re confused and clearly out of your depth.  Where are they?  What are these fresh ruins?  Should I be scared (I was, and still am, by the way!)?  Oh, Fish People! Hey, I know something about fish, they will make me feel better…oh wait…extra-dimensional crazy-talking fish from *below*?  I’m now twice as scared as before!  Get me outta this sector!!!

The oh-so-friendly Arilou.  How nice they are.  To get to them, I need to go to a certain void at a certain time of the month and discover a whole new parallel universe?!!? Amazing!  And I was clearly a stranger in that land.  It was amazing.  And I never stayed in Quasi-Space long because I knew that to be there was fundamentally wrong for a human.  The game never told me that, but it made me feel that – which is infinitely better!

This sense of intrusion was also helped by something as simple as trading.  I love the Melnorme, (see my avatar!) and even they added to the mystery and intrusion of being a human in that universe.  After spending a few hours scouring planets for minerals and RP, I run across a kind race of merchants who couldn’t give a hoot about commerce as I had come to know it!  Again, my legs were kicked out from under me.  Now I had a race of merchants with stuff I desperately needed, and no money that they cared about.  From there, they introduced me to Big Game Hunting, and looking for Rainbows.  *I* had to adapt to them. 

The only piece of normal in the game was the Starbase, and that tiny, fragile sliver of hope was the only place I could call home…and for the strangeness of the rest of the galaxy, I was doubly glad anytime my ship docked with “Home.”  Every one of those 2,000 ready men became suddenly important to me.  I didn’t want any crew to die, because I had now learned that out of the whole galaxy, there were only about 2,000 people that I could call friends and loved ones.

Thanks for reading that whole thing (assuming you did!).  Where this comes in for Stardock is this:

I don’t care what you do with art styles, combat styles, ship designs, or anything else, as long as that sense of being a stranger in my own backyard is present in this new Star Control game!  I want to feel alone, and to be empowered by that.  Don't hold my hand or coddle me.  Kick me out of that airlock and let me learn to breathe vacuum! That is the essence of SC2, and it is the one factor that can integrate any number of changes and re-boots.

Thanks for listening!