As far as the far future is concerned, during the whole 'Offline Gate' thing, we had reassurances that if the game is ever 'Sunset' (Lord, do I HATE that Term), Frontier will release the code to allow the game to be played either offline or even allow players to set up their own server for themselves and friends. I don't know if that's possible with the state of the BGS at the moment but I hope they'll be able to keep that promise.
Personally, I'm hoping that the 2020 update turns out to be the Elite equivalent of No-Man-Sky. The walking around planets, stations and base building is a lot more immersive in NMS than I was expecting and has really improved since release.
I probably would spend more time in NMS but there are a few major issues I have with it ; -
- Space Flight / Space combat is nowhere near as good as Elite's.
- The planets, solar systems and galaxies of NMS don't feel as real or immersive as Elite's.
- I much prefer what's in Elite's BGS to the NMS Equivalent.
- Being able to play in third person perspective (ie, over the shoulder cam). I hated this in Freelancer and it makes any game feel too 'arcade'y regardless of the flight model (The third person mode in Elite's Gunner mode in multi-crew in acceptable, mostly because I played a gunner in X-wing Alliance and Black Prophecy and it was awful).
As I don't see NMS resolving those issues, I'm hoping that we'll get the equivalent in Elite.