I believe you.

Yes, I have. The others in my party who saw it happen just laughed about it.

I'm guessing you were one of the people saying "all lives matter" when BLM appeared?

Sarah Connor's scooter in Terminator:

Hope Bambi makes it.

What is there to explore?

A whole galaxy...

...of the same 5 types of solar systems, 5 types of tasks and 5 types of stations with randomized distances in between.

If you have to ask, you won't understand.

I don't mean to suggest Elite is necessarily a bad game because of it. Every game is ultimately limited in some ways. I've enjoyed most of my time playing it, until I hit the part where any kind of grinding just makes me unwilling to participate. I do occasionally install it, fly around a bit in VR and blast some enemies. That keeps me entertained for a few hours. Then I uninstall it and forget it exists for a few years.

So you might have fun playing it, you might not. There's a fair amount of grinding required to get the better ships or a big number in your credits account. If the limited amount of variety isn't an obstacle for you, then there's a decent chance you'll have fun.

Haven't tried NMS, but I'd guess probably? "A mile wide and an inch deep" is the phrase I've commonly seen used with regards to Elite. Sure, there's a whole galaxy worth of systems, but they're all pretty much the same, with the same activities.

Yes, it's hyperbole. I didn't mean there are literally only 5.

These are my criticisms of the game I've played since the closed beta. Namely that it all feels the same. Yes, like I said in my other comment, there's inevitably repetition in any game, but Elite is very shallow compared to most other sandbox games I've played.

Star types exist, yes, but they're just floating orbs of fire with different colors. Stations and outposts etc exist, but you interact with them in the same way. What is there to interact with? How does it affect the system around it or the gameplay? Factions at war spawn conflict zones, but aside from those, there's very little to make you feel like a war is actually taking place. Exploration? I haven't done that in a long time, but at least before, it consisted of you jumping to a system, honking your system scan and then going to the next system. Engineering is "hey, let's play around with a random number generator", and then wasting a lot of resources you've managed to collect in various places over a not insignificant amount of time.

Yes, it's a sandbox and I don't mind repetition, but if after a week of playing you feel like you've seen pretty much everything there is to see, barring the things you need to grind for, I wouldn't consider it worth the entrance price.

If you consider that "besmirching" the game, then I would call you excessively defensive. It's just a game, and it doesn't need you to defend it.

They're going to milk it until it's dry.

Indeed, many a Saturday I've woken up feeling a bit peckerish.

I had such a crush on Angela Bassett after seeing this.

Fair enough. It's certainly a bit of a departure from 2, and the story is not as strong IMO.

Did you play 3? If so, what did you think of it?

Europe isn't a country.

This is the kind of thing I would've come up with in my early teens when I first discovered sociology.

I was just poking fun at the kinds of people who do think Europe is a country. I do know what you meant.

Whose common sense? Are you going to legislate the definition of that too?

There are really too many flaws to spend time writing a whole essay on it, but okay, for example:

Freedoms of others, including freedom to offend, must be respected. One who violates the freedom of others gives up their freedom

What about the freedom to hold your own beliefs, which you would do away with in the very next rule?