"Epic Game"?
I wish. I really do. But I don' believe it.
SC will suffer from the same essential problem like ED.
Like ED, SC players will consist of mainly "old farts" 40+ and older, with the difference that SC players will be "old farts with big wallets" while in ED it's old farts who played the original Elite back in in 1986.
I don't see a basis for this assumption yet. If you browse the SC forums, you'll see a very diverse group of backers thus far.
There's obviously a group that has dropped a bunch of cash to get the best "pew pew" ship they can buy, but that is just one component of the game.
According to the dev statements, there are SO MANY other ways to build a niche for yourself. You don't even need to own a ship...you can work as a crew member on a big manned vessel; you can sneak sensitive information and human cargo; work as a mercenary on FPS missions; escort cargo ships, exploration / scientific researchers, or rescue vessels with other groups as a team; you can rescue ejected pilots and explore for rare artifacts. If all you have is an Aurora, you can stick with protected trade routes and star systems until you earn enough to equip yourself to venture farther from safety.
You can choose how much risk you are willing to accept....that's part of the excitement of it all. That group of big wallet Super Hornets will likely not be able to hang around highly protected areas, and they will have a hard time tracking you down in a well-equipped, fast, low signature exploration vessel. Want to take a chance and venture into unprotected territory; get a group of dogfighters to accompany you and determine how much you are willing to pay / split the reward.
Dogfighting isn't going to be an end-all, and there will be a relevant place for every individual, despite the level of starting ship or perceived advantage.
That's why I'm excited about this game. It appears to be so much more than a dogfighting sim. And winning? Win at what? There is no end-game....just a universe, one worth actually exploring, where you aren't forced into being a combatant, and you can step out of your ship and view the world around you through the eyes of your character without being locked into a view behind the glass of a cockpit.
I see the potential, and now I'm just waiting for the execution. It's scope is massive, but so is the staff and funding. It can reach it's target, or it could fail. My guess, it most likely will not be *everything* it was promised to be on day-one release, but like Elite Dangerous, the development won't end there, and the content creation and universe will continue to expand as long as the developer is motivated to do so.
I see a lot of the same people who play ED being into SC, and vice versa. They both have something to offer.