Consider range, ship/projectile speed, sprite size, and zoom. A global increase in range is exactly the same as making all sprites smaller and ships/projectiles slower, if maintaining other stats. Which is not something I want, just for stylistic reasons. Longer ranged + faster projectiles is the equivalent of making sprites smaller and ships slower... etc. I agree that things feel short ranged, but its a stylistic choice more in terms of pacing and graphics than anything else. Even now we are zoomed out enough that you can't really see the details on frigates.
I am a bit confused though, as 1 ship length is pretty darn short range. Are you using the Dedicated Targeting Core on Cruisers/Capitals, and the Integrated Targeting unit once you get it? As an example, destroyers with long ranged weapons and ITU (beams or HVD/Maulers) have a 1200 unit range, which I think is about 4 ship lengths, and is nearly off the screen without dev mode zoom out. A ballistic capital ship is going to have anywhere from 1440 to 1920 range depending on guns, while a Paragon can push 2200 on beams. Gunnery implants skill will extend these even further.
In terms of short ranged guns dealing more damage: In general they do, though there are some examples that are more extreme than others. Machine Guns (light single, dual, and heavy) are incredibly effective anti-shield brawling weapons at close range. Long ranged guns like Heavy Mauler and HVD have poorer DPS. The Assault Chaingun is supposed to be a high DPS close ranged gun, but in practice it sucks and should be avoided in nearly all cases in favor of the heavy mortar, which is a medium range gun with excellent stats.