To wit, according to the man himself in the Kickstarter “we have had a couple of false starts on this over the years, where progress wasn’t as good as I wanted.” So whatever status reports might have happened before that, chances are that they didn't actually relate all that much to the final project.
In addition, “other projects have been prioritised – projects with announced dates or other commitments. Up to now “Elite” has been worked upon by a small team as a ‘skunk-works’ activity in the background as availability permits.” That's a characterisation that doesn't leave much room for any work being done in a period where they had just finished off Thrillville; where they were working on LostWinds and Kinectimals; and where they were trying to keep development of The Outsider going. If there ever was an “Elite 4”, it would have been something they started doing after The Outsider
¹, which means it definitely wasn't going on while all those other games were taking up their time. Codemasters pulled out in 2011, removing that last commitment, but let's charitably assume that the project was floundering before that — maybe even as early as 2009 or so — giving them some time to fiddle with (because that's all “skunk-works activity” is) some odd bits and ends.
That would leave a 3-year gap between that early start and the final project, during which they might have been able to eke out a few moments of not-actual-development here and there. What was the result of that? Again, per the man himself, it amounted to “preparing; laying the technology and design foundations for when the time is right” — i.e. engine tinkering that they were doing anyway; preparing, not developing; and waiting…
…a description that would just as well fit what CRobber did starting 1996, once WC4 wrapped up, when he was “essentially […] wanting to do Privateer right”
² (which is mind-bogglingly insulting to the
actual game developers who made that game), but which he never ended up making and then, 16 years later, tried to do a second time
³ using a technology and design foundation that had been layered on since some time before 1999.
⁴
So if anyone wants to follow the tenuous route that some undefined “Elite 4” (supposedly soon to be released after 2008) is the exact same thing as ED, and that this means ED has been in development since, oh, the mid-aughts or so, then they
must by necessity also accept that SC has been in development since 1996 at the very least, and possibly earlier still since Chris wasn't nearly as involved in, or occupied by, WC4 as one is often led to believe.
⁵