I've said it before, and I'll say it again, in fact I'll say it now
- I honestly believe a large motivational factor behind them spending SO MUCH DEVELOPMENT TIME on "new player experience", particularly now, in the run up to "the new era big holy land update" is they want to make the game more enticing to the more stereotypical FPS / RPG player, and are shifting the games focus from a punative and formidable spaceships simulator into to a FPS/RPG with spaceships as a feature.
This is just anecdotal of course, but in my own experience when I explain the game to people (friends and family who aren't that into gaming in general), they're generally impressed by the same things no matter what sort of person they were-- such as the scale of it being a 1:1 scale Milky Way, they always stop and go "oh really? Whoa...". And then the next question almost every time is "can you walk around your ship?", and they seem a lil' bummed when I say we can't do that yet, and then they ask if we can visit planets, and I tell them we can land on any planet or moon as long as it doesn't have an atmosphere.
That answer is normally good enough to quench their "landing on planets" thirst, and they don't follow it up with questions about landing on ELWs and whatnot, and they instead go back to asking about walking around ships and stations. It just seems to be one of those easily sellable ideas that experienced and non-experienced gamers alike find to be appealing, and it makes sense to me if this is indeed one of the reasons Frontier has focused on it for the 2020 update.
To someone who hasn't played the game (out of the folks I know; opinions will naturally vary), being able to land on SOME planets is good enough for now and adding Mars-like planets atmospherics isn't gonna make a big difference even if it'd be a nice step forward for those of us who have played for years... whereas being able to walk around on these giant ships and (possibly) stations in a full scale Milky Way is really easily understood and catches their attention, sparking their imagination.
Depending on the person, they then ask if they NEED to fight in the game, since being able to avoid combat entirely if they wanna is as appealing to some as the idea of endless skill-based combat is for others. I love the combat in the game for the most part, and I look forward to FPS portions of Space Legs, but I do hope they manage to create more non-combat gameplay for on-foot portions since that would seem to be another thing to lure in certain types of players that would likely really enjoy Elite but would be less likely to give it a go if it's ALL shooty shooty. I'm more pessimistic about Frontier's ability to pull that off since everything thus far is so combat-centric and combat has the most fully realized features by far, and I'm picturing Space Legs to be real FPS-focused as far as mechanics go (outside of some minor non-combat things, like repairing our ships).
If they can manage to make Space Legs fun even if ya rarely shoot a gun, that could be something that seals the deal for a lotta folks. And would make plenty of current players pretty happy, I imagine.
The mere idea of Space Legs can be such a lure though, across wide swathes of player types, so to me it makes perfect sense to focus on it from that POV. Once ya mix in cosmetics and junk, or how the game becomes even more streamable, etc etc, it feels like a no brainer. And focusing on the tutorials for new players becomes essential in the meantime.
(My own PERSONAL wants are modern NPC comms that can lead to dynamic gameplay, more persistent NPCs where ya don't see the seams all the time, better risk/reward for criminal gameplay with an overhaul/improvement for smuggling, a much better crime and punishment system, and more missions of all types, but those things aren't as sellable at a glance for a non-player. Hopefully some of it comes alongside the 2020 mega-update though, but we'll see)
I'm fine with either Space Legs or Atmospherics, with me leaning towards Space Legs if I had to pick only one, and all these leaks seem real to me. If we're being mislead somehow though, ooph! Frontier better come out and squash it hard or it'll be a bloodbath if the 2020 update is just mission packs or a campaign or something.
I know Frontier has biffed some things along the way, but I'm optimistic about it even if I'm dubious about the possible implementations of some aspects (no use over-worrying about that for now though). And I know I'll have an easier time getting friends to jump in who wouldn't be that interested before if all these leaks do prove true.
