Elite can be really casual and the kind of thing you pick up for a few minutes here and there, it does take a good amount of time to get better ships and upgrades. I play really casually, actually. There's indepth shit I haven't even taken the time to explore or read up on but the feel of being out in space is just awesome. Making long journeys and scooping energy from stars on the way feels like the right balance of simulationy and video gamey.
You don't lose any money if you change your mind on parts (or even ships if you part them out) so it lets you switch up your entire play style without penalty. I've done a bunch of exploring but right now I'm in a ship geared for battle and doing bounties to grind up to the ultimate exploring ship to take deep into uncharted space. The size of the galaxy is awesome, you feel like hot shit when you register a bunch of planets as first discovered by you, it's the same galactic data across all the platforms. Idk, I just really like it and I'm high and I hope you give it a shot
