There's no in game popups to buy currency or ships, if you ignore the concept sales every few months on the website and just play the game you wouldn't even know they offer any ships for sale with money. Yes, the game is taking very long and the business tactics are something that people aren't fond of, but you can buy the game for $45 and buy or rent most ships with in game currency now, so there's no paywall for content, there's no subscription, you pay upfront once and have every update available to you forever.
On a technical level, it can be both fascinating and frustrating, it can offer experiences you literally cannot have in any other game on the planet and most importantly you can do it with your friends and share memories - but it can also offer you extremely annoying moments where nothing works the way you want it too and introducing the game to new people can be daunting if they don't have the heart for dealing with bugs. Whether success or failure (and what that means is going to be different for everyone), Star Citizen has offered me hundreds of hours of fun with some of the best people I've met.