There are a ton of features in Eve Online, which don't want transferring to Elite and I played a character/account actively for over 10 years (2 day of release iirc) before anyone gets the impression that I've only skimmed the surface of that game. Examples:
Sovereignty combined with choke point jump gates (there used to be more than one entry point to a system) has made the game stale, as it is nigh on impossible to grow a corp/alliance and compete against the established territorial owners. So you either join an existing one or tinker about with other mechanics. Get too big (or too ambitious) and you will attract the attention of the established alliances and the assets and resources they can and will bring to bear against you.
Running a corp of any meaningful size (especially if you have POSs to maintain) is pretty much like running a business and is a nearly full time job. Now that's fine if you want that in your gaming experience, but it gets very wearing after a few years.
Eve has hands down some of the worst AI on the market and makes NPC encounters a farming exercise, which is both tedious and ridiculous (e.g. shooting one cluster of rats only a KM or two away from another and the second group ignoring you mechanic). Most of this was self inflicted as missions used to be challenging, but you should have seen the whining on the forums because there was no "push button" to win and wah wah wah I've lost my spaceship to NPCs (sound familiar?
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The combat at a tactical fleet level is really good in Eve, but again the core mechanics of limited routing options boils this down to almost a game of chess between fleet commanders and to be effective relies on a number of players doing what they are told and when they are told to do it (oh the joys of getting people aligned for warp/jump).
Anyone also claiming the skills system doesn't put new players at a massive disadvantage needs to try and break the tank of a fully fleet and combat skilled player of ten years or so where my ship has a passive tank greater than the active tanks of players that are <5 years old, just due to skills differentials.
The subscription model - this has been one of Eve's strengths by giving it longevity, but also its greatest weakness, as it has allowed certain parties in the game and the forums to in essence dictate the development agenda of the game. This IMHO has led to what will be the downfall of Eve which was starting to push the boundaries of the platform, but then backed away from it.
Eve was not always a stale game. For the first 3-5 years it was very enjoyable and had a lot going for it both in gameplay and future innovations and expansions, but this changed around the time they canned "ambulation" and bowed to pressure groups threatening to cancel their subs en masse (there are already moves in this direction here with Planetary Landings and First Person expansions).
A couple of predictions:
Eve Online will be in severe trouble 6-12 months after Elite goes on general release.
The dominant player groups of Eve will be (and already are) trying to influence Elite's development direction - especially as the two main paradigm shifting expansions draw closer to release).
Having produced a title myself one lesson learned is that "visions and innovations do not get delivered by committee or communities".
So far FDev have shown remarkable resistance to the player base/other interested parties bending their vision and long may this continue.
