The simplistic blocks worked in Minecraft because it was a sandbox game. The blocky shapes made the game accessible to anyone who has ever played with toy blocks as a child.
0x10 sounds like much more an actual game with mechanics rather than a sandbox "do anything".
He said it would involve "hard science", accessing onboard systems, fixing things. Isn't possible to achieve that without bumbling around in these cube like graphics?
If he isn't a one trick pony, perhaps he can devise an alternate 2D tiled way of doing the graphics that still allow customisation. I mean, how many space ship interiors can you really design using just 1 meter x 1 meter cubes?