One thing I've been wondering about for awhile now is if 'early access' (in Steam parlance) games are not a great idea if your goal is to maximize your impact on your retail release. Elite and Star Citizen could both be considered early access, including the other kickstarter games mentioned here like Wasteland 2, etc.
Would games like Skyrim or GTA V have made the large impact they did if they'd had paid alphas/betas for months on end? Would the public tire of them before release? Heck, would *fans* tire of them? I can only speak for myself, but I'm tired of playing games in pre-release states. (Strangely, Elite seems to be the only exception to the rule at this point. Even SC has fallen prey - I haven't fired up my hangar in forever). Wasteland 2? Never play the beta anymore. StarBound? Nope.
Even the media has to get tired of games like that.
Anyway.... rambling.
I will say that I very much like the look of Star Citizen from the last few update videos. Man, I'd *love* it if I could drive one of those huge miner robots in Elite! That's the way mining platforms should have worked in Frontier!
