Those guys are a special kind of stupid.
By latest metrics, about 175 whales bought the Kraken with warbonds (new cash money) @ $1,400.
And they *claim* (it's bs) to have 2M backers.
Basically, Star Citizen is where it has been since 2016 whereby a few whales are paying for those who don't pay anything anymore or who just have a base package. This is the standard model for F2P games; except those are completed products.
When the final end comes, it's going to be all kinds of hilarious because it hasn't occurred to whales yet that it's not a sustainable model when you have about 450 people working worldwide and you have a burn rate of approx $4m a month in which key studios are literally insolvent (according to their UK financials).
Something's gotta give. Which explains the quiet exits, inability to hire top talent etc.
You can't fix stupid, but you can laugh at it.