I object.
I bought the Cobra wireframe paintjob because it was a special 30th Anniversary Limited Edition one. Re-opening that particular one for sale would devalue it. It should remain sacrosanct. Plus at £10 it was expensive for a paint job, which I paid my limited funds for, precisely because I'm an 84'er and precisely because it has special meaning for me and others who grew up with Elite.
Listen, I missed Kickstarter, you don't see me asking FDEV to resurrect the KS so I can get into the DDF and private forums <--- I missed that one. Do I whine about it? Nope.
Please, please FDEV do not do this.
Produce wireframe paintjobs for the other shps? No problem. But please keep the Cobra one to have the meaning you implied when you put it out there originally!
But it has the same 'personal' value to me - i have my original boxed 5.25" boxed edition and cassette to prove it (and BBC Master to play 'em on, plus Amiga version, Amiga FE2 etc.), yet i have to make all my online purchases with a pre-pay card which i can only very rarely afford to use. I joined this forum as soon as it opened back in 2006, and was a regular on A.F.E for a decade beforehand.. i drooled over the wireframe paintjob when it was announced but didn't have the spare cash then..
So from my point of view you've recieved an in-game perk purely for being wealthier than i. I have to pay for such commodities as special treats, as and when i'm able. But just because you can click and spend without such handicaps, you think i'm less deserving? That you've earned
in-game a badge of exclusivity that i should be denied?
Special perks for high-paying founders are one thing (whether that's access to the founder's world, decals or wotnot), but i've been saying for years how cool it'd be to have wireframe paintjobs in E4. I rememebr making one partcular post, years ago, relating how, as a kid, wireframe paintjobs was how i rationalised the graphics in classic Elite, that i'd sometimes look to the night sky and daydream how cool it would be if a wireframe cobra flew down and landed before me, and the hatch opened, stairs unfolding, beckoning me.. eat-your-heart-out
Last Starfighter-style... so for all i know, maybe i inspired the idea?
But yeah, no, you're right; you deserve it more than me. I'm unworthy, purely by dint of being occassionally cash-strapped. And maybe, if i hadn't spent so much time in-game i'd have a better paying career now? But no, whatever, you deserve your special badge of exclusiveness. I'm just a fly-by-night cowboy - and you're a proper devotee, aren't you. Well done you.
/rant