DRM-free is nice and all, but unfortunately for something like starbound, the better option is to get it on steam, mainly for two reasons. One, you can get mods elsewhere, but it's much easier to manage with the Steam Workshop. That part of the starbound community is VERY active to this day too. Second thing is multiplayer. While you can connect to others via ip, it is a hot mess to do so manually more often than not. So to play with friends, you're usually forced to go in a server or play locally if you or your friend can't do the manual hosting process correctly. There's also a third thing before you consider playing this game: It runs better under most Linux enviroments as compared to Windows.
In an space exploration way, NMS has been a good game from the very beginning. The updates only improved it. A few things would be interesting to have back, like random bases found out and about that you can claim, but there is very minor stuff to complain about this game nowadays. Multiplayer? I play with that turned off most of the time. The MP update barely changed my experience. What DID change my experience the most were the expeditions, the sentinel and the pirates updates. Next step is being able to finally play this game in VR before Hello Games moves on to their next title, and I hope it's as good or even better than this. (acquired on Steam, and Playstation aftwerwards.)
