About mid January, there was an episode of Around the 'Verse where Sandi and Ben both addressed the stretch goal awards. They said information would be released 'soon' as to the development and deployment of all stretch goal items.
Sandi closed by saying something cute like "good...I want my space pet darnit!"
So I believe CIG is well aware of people's impatience over these things and, at least, plans to give us info to set our expectations.
Personally, I'd rather they focus on bigger issues (like ship/input device/weapons balancing), but they hear our cries over the little things too. Which is amazing/awesome.
Speaking of balancing, this week's AtV had some info addressing those issues. Ben says they are aware of the chatter and concern in the forums and are addressing those issues. Then they did a segment with a dev in Santa Monica on balancing and all he addressed was weapon balancing. That was disappointing to me as weapon balancing is a minor issue in comparison to input device and ship balancing. Was really hoping to hear how they were going to address the input device balancing/issues. To me, that's the single biggest weakness in SC right now. Stats clearly show that k/m > HOTAS/HOJAM/Flight Stick > Controller. Are they going to balance that? If so, how?
Man just tell me so I know what to expect. Personally I want to use my new Thrustmaster 16000 for immersion reasons. And I'm ok if that's not balanced with k/m (just tell me). But right now HOJAM is a mess and doesn't work well at all (per various posts in the forums).
Yeah, I need patience too......