I'm an early backer of the game ($35) and give it a try once per year or so. This update (3.10) has some long overdue changes to the flight model which sound nice.
That said their roadmap is a joke - it doesn't even have the non-alpha phase on it.
It's painfully obvious now that as long as the developers remain in this early development phase, they are able to raise large amounts of money through the sale of virtual spaceships. As soon as there is a real game to play, this well will likely dry up. Will there be other source of capital? Probably, but they may not be as rich.
My perspective is that they're losing too much momentum, and looks like the game (if ever will have a full release), will be for a niche of the niche that started following the project.
I mean, how will they even market this among triple A titles budgets? They can't even take the ride for the "new space age" hype from media entertainment/tech achievements.
Part of the strength of this type of "business model" is precisely the backing of a community that want things to happen... but like you said, they're stretching it beyond what's reasonable.
I can only assume that with this development budget - which is in the AAA level - they must need AAA sales level, right? Or are they marking up this game for 200 USD annual subscriptions (assuming is 10x20 USD (avg season pass for AAA gamees?? no idea)?
They don't need to make their money back because they never invested any, people have already bought the game. The employees are paid, CR has taken his salary. Mission accomplished. It's more nuanced than that, but it is definitely not a traditional invest > produce > reward cycle. It was more like reward > produce > reward/debt, remains to be seen.
The long term goal though is to sell in game currency, and it's that simple I think. I imagine we will see ship sales continue after launch, but you will instead have people paying for in game currency and buying the ships in game. While you could grind for them in game, many people will just buy the currency to save time.
That said their roadmap is a joke - it doesn't even have the non-alpha phase on it.
It's painfully obvious now that as long as the developers remain in this early development phase, they are able to raise large amounts of money through the sale of virtual spaceships. As soon as there is a real game to play, this well will likely dry up. Will there be other source of capital? Probably, but they may not be as rich.