On a tangent, I did play Stardock's Star Control: Origins, and it was all right; it kept the space combat pretty much as-is, I enjoyed learning the new ships, and they didn't have that godawful Ethics Committee from Star Control 3 to limit my choices. (Granted, I usually play a good guy, but there was a moment in SC3 where you had to not shoot an actively hostile alien, because it was possible to talk them down.) There was a good variety of aliens, too: the final enemies-from-another-dimension, and the enslaved-by-software guys you eventually ally with were creative.
I didn't like the planet exploration; I get that doing a 3d exploration of a planet is what you've got to do in a modern game, but the limited view meant that it would take a while to finish getting the loot from a planet. SC2's exploration, while slightly dull, was at least quick and didn't overstay its welcome.
I also didn't like the fetch-quests in Origins; there were thankfully few in the base game, but the idea of "gather X resource which you may or may not have harvested and sold already" doesn't work well in Star Control.
And I didn't end up getting the DLC; the base game was all right, but I was ready to be done with it when I finished the game. (And honestly, I don't remember it that well anymore; I played it a few years ago.) I expect Free Stars to be a much better game, but at least I'm not expecting it to be Best Of All Time or anything.