I just had an idea for Red Colony...

Since the game is about exploring and colonizing (hmm... where have I seen that before? heh) - I'm imagining a board covered with face down tiles. Probably square tiles, as opposed to hexes, but that remains to be determined. The tiles could have some kind of terrain or features on them. When you build a "building," you do so without knowing what's on the tile - you flip the tile face up and place your building marker or whatever on it. The terrain or features might be symbiotic or amenable to that particular building, or they might not. I don't imagine there'd ever be a huge penalty, maybe some additional cost, or sub par efficiency (depending on what the building does).

Then there could be an Assay action, which could cost some time/effort/resources, and would allow you to peek at a face down tile.

Thus, in general you build whatever buildings you want to pursue your strategy, and you do it wherever it's convenient. Or, if you prefer, you can spend the extra time and cost up front to find better places to build each building, and maybe your better placement will yield more efficient results or VPs or whatever.

it's not a particularly deep thought about the game, but I think I like the idea and wanted to get it posted somewhere before I forgot :)