I'd recommend very black and white villains/heroes. That was a big part of the sci-fi of that era. Ming the Merciless for example, there wasn't a lot of nuance to him, he was just simply the bad guy. He destroyed and enslaved simply because he wanted to.
So the best thing I think you could do is use that same concepts your game. Make the PC's heroes of great virtue and the bad guys despicable villains that are irredeemably evil.
Then add the aesthetics like you mention and you'll likely go a long way to getting that fee.
Commando Cody would be a good one for at least villains. Cody and his crew use traditional firearms while the moon dwellers use rayguns.
For ships. This sexy beast.
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-gZ0rqIYEj9g/UHMiCA4e0zI/AAAAAAAAAvI/kPksIzdoynI/s 1600/cygnus1.jpg
Doesn't have to be exact. At least with capital ships, Gothic esthetic but probably shouldn't fly but can. Smaller ships your traditional 50s style VTOL rockets. As a friend of a friend put it, "going back to basics".
To really capture the "heroic feel" of the Ray Gun Gothic era of Sci-Fi, I would suggest importing the rules for Hero Points from the APG.
First I'd suggest be one hundred percent sincere...
No wink to the audience.
No being Self referential or Self aware reducing your game to a half parody and or deconstruction of the era.
Be idealistic, the mocking,cynical,jaded I've seen it all attitudes of modernity must be thrown out the window!
Black and White morality is the norm, shades of gray are rare.
Sleek,shiny,chrome, space ships.
Computers as we known them are completely none existent, the smallest PC is about the size of a large modern television and is little more than a sophisticated calculator;it might have some media player and telecommunication functions, might.
Truly powerful computers are huge machines the smallest are about the sizes of kitchen refrigerators, the biggest take up entire buildings.
There is in all likelihood no analog to the Internet thus no Net-culture especially social media, and no Hackers.
Though In the real world a primitive analog the Internet was developed but not implanted in the mid 1940s, if one supposes the Memex or an equivalent was actually constructed...then you can get your cyberpunk on.
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Things are grand and larger than life bordering on flamboyant, think epic fantasy but with future technology as filtered through the lens of the 1940s. Do not skimp on descriptive adjective, go purple prose if you have to.
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FLASH OH OH! HE'S FOR EVERY ONE OF US!
The party (and this kinda sucks) needs to have a male human envoy who is clearly the narrative focus, although you can split the party when he gets captured and have them go on an adventure to rescue him from the villain's clutches.
The villain HAS to have a hawt daughter who falls for our hero.
Evil twirls their mustaches and boasts loudly about their plans for nefarious wrong-doing.
Key Elements:
-Language: Full of hope & bluster, or venom & more bluster for villains or naivete & curiosity for civilians.
-Sense of Wonder/Awe: Big set pieces, lots of "unknown" to explore per planet despite having sentient natives everywhere, large armies to defeat/deter, intriguing alien customs to learn.
-Romance: The swashbuckling kind. Lots of leaping & swooning.
-Deathtraps: Gotta have despicable deathtraps. Bwah, hah, hah! This wouldn't only be when heroes are captured, but major plots by recurring villains to set up the heroes.
-Technology: Some might be ubiquitous, like wristcoms, translators, & a few genre weapons. Most would be rare, with little travel or trade between planets, and hence the need for the heroes to make contact. Energy doshku weaponry might be the creations of the Bird People of Planet X, for example. Or for a Pact Worlds example, you can only buy Lashunta armor on Castrovel from actual Lashunta you've engaged with.
Mechanics:
-Fisticuffs: These would need a boost so they're effective. Maybe remove archaic quality, confer Weapon Specialization, or just use the most similar tech item to determine reasonable damage.
-Non-lethal: Knocking out foes should be commonplace, except the very vilest which often die in a spectacular way tied to the set piece, once they reach 0 h.p. Heroes, of course, get captured to further the villain's plot or sate vengeance.
-Tactics: Lots more pew-pew, shooting at crates. Also more parlaying & surrendering, or even turning (misinformed) enemies into allies based mainly on if they're cool or sexy enough to keep around.
-Classes: Tech-reliant classes (Mechanic, Operative Hacker, Technomancer) would be very rare, a commodity worth kidnapping even (except maybe on Planet of the Tech-People!). Likely Mystics too.
-"Handy Ray-Gun": You may want the PCs to be able to upgrade their weapons as they level without referencing...
-Money: Heroism & adventure is its own reward, which makes it hard to keep up with the power curve! So maybe hide the mechanics of money by just upgrading their equipment "behind-the-scenes" to level appropriate versions or level-appropriate damage with same version. Or their resident tech guru simply hands out a new gun they've been working on.
Wish you the best with this. Cheers.
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-Classes: Tech-reliant classes (Mechanic, Operative Hacker, Technomancer) would be very rare, a commodity worth kidnapping even (except maybe on Planet of the Tech-People!). Likely Mystics too.
this is a great point. it's going to be all envoys, maybe one or two of the brands of operative, and soldiers. and the soldiers aren't going to be the type who carry around cannons, but are more likely going to be the pew pew or punchy types.
well... you might have a mechanic. but he'll have a drone, not an exocortex.