Let me preface with, I really enjoyed the game and couldn’t put it down but after beating the Outer Wilds base game, I have thoughts and I think this would get down voted to oblivion in the Outer Wilds group so here I am. This is just my experience but the game was sold to me as this inventive organic puzzle solving adventure where you’d stumble upon clues and solve puzzles but in reality it’s a journal scrap hunting game. There are circular glyphs on every planet that tell you how to solve almost every puzzle. I spent 5 hours ignoring these glyphs cause I assumed they were nothing more than lore dumps but in reality they are progress gates. I assumed this game would work more like Animal Well where the game tells you literally nothing and you have to experiment with your tools and knowledge to solve puzzles but nope. I’d hesitate to even call this game a puzzle game, it’s honestly more of a casual exploration game which there is nothing wrong with that, but seems more accurate.
I’m sorry you had this experience but I didn’t read the majority of the lore dumps, and either flung myself using the ship to solve the majority of puzzles or just kept fucking around until I figured it out. I wish you had a better time playing it.