I do not even think it is a matter of sandbox vs. themepark....unfortunately, it was/is just a bad game and a terrible use of the Star Wars license. Most aspects of the game are just not fun, plain and simple.
With mmorpgs, true rpg fans respect and understand the statistical nature of the games with stats and gear and currency. They should also expect some kind of "grind" because when time is assigned to a task(character progression) its inevitable there…