And I have "played" it multiple times for a short while over the years myself. Anyone saying it is perfectly playable in its current state is a liar and part of the cult. It's a glorified half broken tech demo.

And yes, it is vaporware, because there's so much feature creep that it will never see the light of day. They constantly completely re-write systems, often times systems that have been already re-written a couple of times. A lot of newer systems don't fit in well with previous systems or other aspects that are now very much outdated, which means they have to redo them too (like various ships). It's a constant redoing of things that have been done already. All while the major tech needed for what they claim to aim at is still not really there. And all of this comes on top of them adding completely new features instead of focusing on fixing & finishing what's already there.

It's not vaporware, I agree.
It is however, a money scam.