Studios spent too much time making the game look nice and not enough time in the story, characters, and world building.

Guy is talking about Sid Meiers Alpha Centauri a super old game and Civilization: Beyond Earth the spiritual successor, in fact quite a few people have tried to do a spiritual successor to Alpha Centauri and most have failed, because most fail at the good part of Alpha Centauri which is its story about 7 factions/ideologies fighting it out. Beyond Earth couldn't stay serious and so most of the factions leaders are charicatures that don't believe their own ideology same as Pandora. Like they have an Ayn Rand Hypercapitalist guy and in the original game the guy believes his own stuff fully while in later editions he's the 'I'd buy that for a spacebuck' guy.

Edit: Just a few quotes from AC

Life is merely an orderly decay of energy states, and survival requires the continual discovery of new energy to pump into the system. He who controls the sources of energy controls the means of survival. -CEO Nwabudike Morgan "The Centauri Monopoly"

The popular stereotype of the researcher is that of a skeptic and a pessimist. Nothing could be further from the truth! Scientists must be optimists at heart, in order to block out the incessant chorus of those who say "It cannot be done." -Academician Prokhor Zakharov "University Commencement"

You see in this dome the intermingling of native and earth plants. Outside, they are competitors, struggling over the trace elements required for life. Often, one destroys the other. Here, they are tended with care and kept well nourished. They thrive together, and the native fungus does not unleash its terrible defenses. As you can see, competition is unnecessary when resources are plentiful and population growth is controlled. -Lady Deirdre Skye "Planet Dreams"

civilization 5 in space is not very interesting. alpha centauri, civ 2.5 in space, was much more interesting. if you set a game in a sci fi or fantasy universe you have to do some creativity and worldbuilding and show/tell the player who these factions are. civ5 in space didn't, it's just kind of bland