I would also say that one big advantage Elite had so far is that it's available on consoles, whereas Star Citizen is only available on PC. So Frontier, in theory, has a much bigger reach of potential players and customers. Elite is even on Xbox Game Pass which surely boosts player numbers, and more engagement most certainly leads to more spending (either ARX or buying the full game).
Throwing this advantage away and dropping consoles is a very bad move. Frontier essentially drops a big part of Elite's community and market, and I agree that if they want to get Odyssey's act together and somehow save Elite only on PC then they're suddenly at a disadvantageous position compared to the competition. It not only maddens me as a long-time console Elite player but I also think this approach will damage Elite on PC as well. If anything, the console playerbase could have been a saving grace as there's no real competition on these platforms (No Man's Sky is interesting but is fundamentally different in my opinion). It could have been a lifeline to introduce a console Beta or early access - ironically enough that's how Elite debuted on Xbox in the first place, in the Game Preview programme. They could've done the same with Odyssey, releasing a half-baked version in Game Preview and build from there, with real-world experience and feedback even on old consoles, helping optimisation tremendously on both PC and console hardware.
But no, instead they just dropped consoles from their plans, restricting their own optimisation opportunities, their playerbase, their pool of feedback, losing a meaningful amount of playerbase, losing on markets where they had no direct competition and collecting a huge amount of negative reputation in the process.
![[PS4] Filthymick420](https://forums-cdn.zaonce.net/data/avatars/m/201/201444.jpg?1555738739){kind=avatar}
