tmbrodie

I see the value of the career mode/contracts as a way to teach what can be done, and how it can be done -- as a preliminary to freeing us to launch out into adventures we might otherwise not be able to do, or even know to do. When you're limited in access to tech by the science tree, there is a discipline to learning to use what you have effectively so that when you're in a much more difficult place you can both construct and execute an appropriate solution. There's also the development of how we think about that tech in its limitations and application. For example, (for me) I found that the lack of parts early in the science tree caused great challenge in landing on Mun and Minmus, especially when trying to land within a hundred meters of a previous landing site. The skills gained in doing this mini goal enabled better understanding and appropriate skills to accomplish the mechanics of orbital rendezvous. If I tried the latter without the former, then it was only somewhat through luck that it got done. Kind of scratching my head... hmmm how did I get that done again? Having an early tree contract offered to do a Minmus landing would have gently moved me to that sooner, and I would have advanced faster. So what would be fun for me would be to have a more open end game after the science tree career that wouldn't open up until the tree was done. Even if it was, there would be no point as to actually play the end game would require skills and thinking that would be absent if you hadn't climbed the tree via appropriate contracts/goals. I mean, the initial value of watching someone's YT of how to do something often results in first saying, "what, you can do that?!" Then a time where you can't even get there to try it out yet, let alone get any traction on what the person was demonstrating. Then finally you get there, and wow, that demo was actually very awesome 'cause it made the whole difference to my success! So totally resonate with your idea of "more to do" -- its what I also envision as this end game. We gain skills, tech and methodology to explore the unexplored -- and without those -- remains the unexplorable.