For me, I don't consider more ships, planetary landings, station variety, community goals, etc. content. Not the kind of MEANINGFUL content that I'm looking for anyway. The biggest problem that I have with the game is that it revolves around earning credits. Even the Powerplay update, I'm sorry to say, is a massive disappointment because it doesn't address the lifeless universe with meaningless activities. Instead all it adds is a separate screen for doing missions that are nothing more than renamed combat zones and courier quests. Sure, you can PRETEND the game has purpose behind your actions, but at the end of the day it's all null and void because all of your activities are still divorced from consequence and visual feedback.
Instead what we (still) have is:
Trading: Pick an item from the spreadsheet that is in high supply, sell it to another system that has high demand. It doesn't matter what it is, whether progenitor cells or imperial slaves, because they all do the same thing (i.e. sit in your cargo hold and await to be transferred). What's the purpose behind it? Credits. Credits, mind you, that are capped off at around 2,000cr profit no matter if you went from one end of the galaxy to the other.
Exploration: Fly out across the empty galaxy and click a button for a listing of whats in the system. See if there isn't anything interesting for you to fly up to and point your ship at for 30 seconds. What's the purpose? OH YOU GET TO SEE WHATS OUT THERE!!! Big freaking deal, so you saw one hunk of sphere that looks different than another and get to put your name on it. Does it do anything for you? Is there any tangible benefit of seeing something or having your name on something? Nope, but maybe you can sell the data for, guess what, credits.
Mining: So you put your pennies together and fitted out a mining vessel. Great! Head on over to a pre-existing RES or ring and shoot at rocks. Collect all the pieces, it isn't rocket science. Press a button to process it and now you have some minerals or metals. Awesome. What can you do with it? Well, you can find a station and sell it for: credits.
Combat: Whether you're a bounty hunter or a pirate it matters not, the end result is the same. You fly around looking for targets, maybe play an interdiction game here and there, and pew pew for a while. Or you can go to any one of the pre-existing combat zones that will supply you with an unlimited amount of targets with a capital ship waiting for you to arrive before it jumps in. You either get bounty vouchers, for credits, or can pirate cargo and smuggle them into black markets....for credits.
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And that's pretty much all there is to the game. You can try to fart sniff your way out of it by desperately trying to find some roles to play for a while, but the fact of the matter is that once you been to one system you've been to them all. The bulletin board missions are the same stuff just with different names and payouts, and frankly I'm not one that's so easily amused as to continue this charade for months on end. Currently even X-Rebirth has more life to it's galaxy.
What can be done about it? Well, lots of stuff. First they can add the types of content to the game that would provide an actual purpose to your actions by giving you meaningful consequences to your decisions with visual feedback. Right now whether you jump into a system that is on lockdown, in a boom, a civil war, etc. is of no consequence. It's not harder to acquire supplies, more dangerous for bounty hunters, or more interesting missions to be involved in. There aren't any NPC's pulling other NPC's out of supercruise, there are no checkpoints in front of stations making sure an enemy doesn't sneak by. There are no traders or haulers going to and fro from the planets delivering much needed water/supplies to the stations. There are no capital ships battling each other in front of stations, etc. Adding in visual feedback of the state of a system would be a good first step making the universe feel alive.
The types of actual content that I would like to see are:
Trading: Let there be an actual purpose to the things we trade. Each item that is on the market should have an actual value with actual demand. This would mean letting players manufacture stuff from blueprints in order for trade goods to be useful in the first place. Allow players to store modules, weapons, ammo, ships, etc. and manufacture them by using the trade goods to build the needed modules. Let players find an under served market that is about to go to war and make a huge profit running their own weapons, etc.
Exploration: This sort of goes with trading, but for heaven's sake let players be able to have a use for the things they discover. For instance, if you go 1000's of light years away from habitable space and discover a pristine metallic ring next to an earth like world, let players build small scale manufacturing hubs to mine the minerals and establish a point of contact from where you can store resources for expansion. This would also give you a reason for taking a convoy of Type-9's along for the ride with the necessary security to protect them. Much actual gameplay could be had here. And that's just part of exploration, furthering the goals would be able to discover other things beyond planets like derelict ships/stations which enables a quest to find out what happened. Maybe you discover the truth about something and find a valuable material that you can use for manufacturing?
Mining: Well there really isn't too much you can do about mining. You can make it a more involved process, I guess. Instead of pointing your light sticks at a rock and wait for the chunks to come off, maybe you have to scan it first and mine in particular spots. But whatever the case, mining would go right along with manufacturing. Refining the ore to a material that you need for a ship, or sell it on the market and become a supplier. Maybe charge a premium for your material if you're selling it in an agricultural economy and people just don't want to find a refinery economy. A necessary cog in the wheel you are, but a thankless job.
Combat: The act of combat in and of itself is pretty fun, but the current system of grinding combat zones and RES sites is a joke and needs an overhaul. What I would like to see is meaning and resolution in these zones when they develop, and have a visual impact on the state of affairs within a system. I want to see those tutorial missions that sparked my IMAGINATION back in Alpha. You know, the ones where you are intercepting a convoy in delivery of medical supplies, or the one where you are sneaking around assassinating federal ships under the nose of a mercenary cobra. Things that actually had context behind them that made you think you really messed up someones day - but see the impact on the bulletin boards for a mission to track down the assassin. Catch them in the act of laying an ambush. I would like to see NPC's interdicting each other and joining in the offense/defense, making way for an escort mission or some corporate espionage. I want to DO the poisoning of the progenitor cells. Something.
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I could go on, but I just wanted to give out my opinion about what I consider "content". I want to see the workers floating around outside of a station putting it together, or a shipyard birthing an anaconda. I want to be able to sabotage or protect it, or build my own. Steal important documents under the nose of the Federation and be chased across the galaxy. I want to fly out of a station only to realize that a capital ship is trying to blockade it and watch a battle develop. I want to interact with contacts outside of this controller-designed UI. Play a game of cards and win some slaves that I can put to work in my narcotics factory. I want to BE captured and sold into slavery to work in a narcotics factory for an hour or so, or escape.
Let's just get away from grinding credits, please. They should be a means to an end, not what the game revolves around.
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