I disagree with both of your statements. It is a designer's job to create (or note) game mechanics and a game alwayd "forces" some rules on the player by nature. What do you want to "explore" insight your ship? Do you really need more areas in Elite where you can just "look at things"?
Bringing more SRVs to the game alone, would not add much, if there won't be additional content making them actually a serious consideration for the players.
When they first brought in the SRV, they promised that the Scarab was the first of many. There would be cargo carriers to allow hauling of goods between planetary bases, prospecting an mining versions to allow exploitation of surface (and sub surface minerals), and exploration buggies. But all those fell by the wayside (along with the hoped for game play). So what are we expecting from legs? Because what I think we'll effectively get is a space suit shaped SRV that allows us to explore the narrow spaces where a Scarab can't get. Maybe we get to sneak around Gueadian sites on foot, but it will essentially be the same game play, with a slightly different coloured sky, and a slower rate of travel.
I'd like to think what we would get is possibly what we've been promised long ago. Boarding other ships, fighting in the corridors, meeting up in bars in the stations, even just the ability to open the doors at the back of the Bridge in the Cutter and see what lies beyond. However bitter experience has taught that what we will get will be nothing like this, and will probably be bug ridden and break much of what is already there. Based on what we've seen and heard so far, do you think legs will be anything other than a new way to "look" at things?
We will be left with Horizons, which will probably receive no love going forward, as I fear the low take up of EDO will be the death knell for the game as Frontier branch out into the platform and console markets.
It's funny, but if you go on the Jurrasic World and Planet Zoo forums, you see many of the same complaints you see here on the ED forum, lack of depth of gameplay, an emphasis on "fripperies" that you can buy in the store rather than on fixing the many long-standing bugs in the game, and gereally disinterested developers and forum moderators. It's like a pattern emerging...
Don't get me wrong, I love this game, but mainly for the beauty of it in VR (which it will no longer have). I've not tried Squadrons yet, but Wings are still shot with instancing issues and nav-lock not necessarily dropping you in the same instance as your wingman. The peer-to-peer networking model means that they steer clear of subscriptions to maintain a game server, but I personally would pay a subscription if it meant we could guarantee clean instancing (or not even needing it, and like EVE all be in the same instance at the same time).
Before we get legs it would be nice if they fixed PowerPlay and brought back a Narrative to the game, a purpose for the political factions to exist, rather than just a grind for a few special bits of equipment. Galnet might have been mostly pointless, but at least it gave the universe some colour, some thread you could weave your own narrative around in your head.
If they can't be bothered maintaining a narrative, hand it over to players, let Galnet reflect what's happening. Why shouldn't the local news announce the successful assassination of a reknowned pirate or the hunamitarian relief efforts of shipping thousands of tonnes of food, shelter and medicines to a beleaguered planet.
Do we honestly think EDO will make any of these shortcomings go away?
![[VR] Mad Mike](https://forums-cdn.zaonce.net/data/avatars/m/27/27910.jpg?1553527108){kind=avatar}
