At the moment there's no customization, my plans are to add buyable modules/weapons in the future (I'm busy making the first unlockable fleet right now). You can spend resources for research but they are for the moment only passive bonuses and ship unlocks.

Yes, there's an endgame and a last battle. This last level has a fixed difficulty and so far there has been mixed opinions about its difficulty. What people need to know is that the idea is to gather all possible resources in the galactic map before going to the final battle or you'll be destroyed very quickly (and also losing one or two times before finishing the game is not the end of the world). So yes, I would say that I'm inspired by FTL's difficulty.

I have to comment, a bit late perhaps, that yes, as a player at the end game, the last battle is soul crushingly hard. I have not been able to successfully finish it despite getting to that stage. I did however, lose a significant amount of my fleet right before I arrived at the destination. I have to admit, sometimes I wonder if I should just start over again, because I really am stuck, but I am quite stubborn when it comes to difficult games.

Its ultimately why I like games like FTL, Dwarf Fortress, Rimworld, Neo Scavenger, and Project Zomboid. The difficulty drives me to continue trying to succeed. And honestly, Nomad Fleet, while still a work in progress, is pretty difficult at times.

Well, the new levels and fleets that I have planned should not only increase the replayability of the game but also give more opportunities for players to power up before the last battle so I advice you to stay tuned for the future patches.

The first time I got to the ending I hoplessly lost as I bee-lined to the end. The 2nd time I played the game I crushed the ending with probably only 60% fleet loss (I did lose a large carrier though). So I don't think the end scenerio is too hard, I don't think it is too easy. It is an endurance challenge and done right. The down side is a complete play through is 4 hours or so. However, I do dig the BSG feel. In addition to customizable fleets I would like to see more encounters, maybe more factions, and more interactions. (nebula that restrict vision? tell fighters to comicazi, fighters have a defend target function, definetly the larger carrier be able to get more weapons so you can choose to risk it in battle or not)

That last battle did not disappoint. I had a pretty potent fleet by then, and I still found myself scrambling a bit.