I think you have a point to an extent. Thing with ED is that the ships, the immerision and sense of being in command of your own starship really is special, the vistas, the environments, etc..

yet the actual nitty gritty gameplay is quite bland, particuarly the generic missions. A lot of people make their own fun in game, we've seen the fuel rats, the DW trip, the PvP league players created, Elite racers etc..

The game does still have a long way to go but its made strong progress this year imo. I agree though the rank grind particuarly for Imps and Feds is lousy and serves no other purpose other than creating a very long grind to gate access to ships. Pity.

I think the problem here is time and resources and cash. Theres only so much Frontier can create content wise and there are limitations on whats possible re the scope of the game. I've long said that the players are the most interesting part of ED and it would be much more interesting if it was more player led, rather than the way Frontier are curating the game. Yeah a little bit more like EvE, more sandboxy..

But whenever I say this a thousand carebears cry in terror and shout me down. So, back to the grind it is.