Originally posted by RattyB:

The big problem I ran into was that, after a certain point, it seemed to become clear that exploring the vast map of many islands was kind of a boondoggle. There was really no reason to explore all the islands other than to establish bases on them - which might be fun from a PVE standpoint, but seemingly did nothing to advance the gameplay. It was kind of like playing for the sake of playing after I passed a certain point of skill and accomplishment.

To me, you understand the game well. There is no excuse to give and no consolation to expect for that.

I believe that this game is a pleasant and economic time-spender, blended with a correct challenging environment, at least during the biomes conquest phase. Don't have high expectations beyond this.

Yeah, there is no reason to explore all islands, except for finding new configurations of resource nodes, sometimes new scenery, and new places to build. As many have said about this game, the travel is fun too, and perhaps the travel is all that matters. Is it what you call "playing for the sake of playing"? In Valheim, you level up while having fun exploring, or just managing your estates or spending time, but you don't necessarily have fun while levelling up for the sake of levelling up, or achieving something "remarkable".

Plus, as others said, there is no problem in alterning between two or more games. As compared to other potential predominantly time spenders like MMOs, there is no daily achievement to miss.
I am not scheduling to remove Valheim from my hard disk any time soon.