I think the essential Fractal concept has always been the best possible sound quality, with a rugged, and utilitarian interface, and there is sort of a beauty in that. There are certainly products on the market that have a flashy GUI, with big displays, lots of colored lights, touch strips, software interfaces that are pretty to look at, but nothing sounds as good (IMO at least) as the Axe.
I've had software l like Bias, Amplitube 4.0 etc, and they have a darn slick presentation, but the sounds....ehhh......
No doubt part of that is because a lot of the develop time/cost went into coding that slick looking GUI. Bias for example looks cool, but its only skin deep. Sure its cool to change amp models and have the knobs switch to "correct" skirted top hats, to chicken head, to rounded metal knobs, to better look like the amp the model is based off, but does the GUI of a knob matter as far as the tone goes ? Not one bit.
Does a Plexi model sound/feel more accurate if when you select that model the background color in Axe-Edit turns golden and has 4 holes ? Nope. Looks cool, yes, and sure, having the GUI for Lepoud HyBrit model open on your DAW is well and good, fun stuff, but the tone isn't there (thought is darn fine for a free VST!)
Fractal is a small company, and has limited resources. They could likely stop all further software/hardware development and shift all resources to making the slickest GUI, or "skin" for Axe-Edit, but personally, I'd rather they put that time into further refining the Flanger and Phaser blocks.
After all, when I'm playing my guitar, I'm not watching a computer monitor, nor is the audience.
All I really need is a great tone, the ability to quickly tweak it, and then for my needs, 5 rugged stomp switches, and 2 exp pedals, that my clumsy size 12's can find in the dark to change scenes and sweep the wah etc.