25 minutes ago, KungFuFerret said:That doesn't help to counter the concern that they are trying to rehash ESB. They might be bigger, and have a different number code, but come on, they're AT-AT's for all intents and purposes. The fact that "they're bigger" doesn't really change much. It didn't really change much for the Starkiller base in Awakens. Even Han commented it's like the Death Star "just bigger".
Maybe that's intentional with the First Order to reflect the group's mindset?
After all, they're really just a scaled down version of the Galactic Empire, lacking the vast resources that Palpatine had his disposal. So in turn, the First Order winds up overcompensating for their smaller size by using bigger and ostensibly "better" versions of what the Empire had. Starkiller Base being a prime example of this, as well as the new walker designs and their new Star Destroyers.
We don't really know the story behind Starkiler Base, namely how long it took to construct; for all we know it took most of that 30 years between RotJ and ANH to get it operational. Of course, prior to the EU becoming a thing nobody really knew the full story of what it took the construct the Death Star, which in and of itself is just as much a gimmicky plot device as Starkiller Base, with fan-wankery concocted to explain why the DS1 had to orbit around Yavin Prime in order to have a clear shot at Yavin IV, instead of just blasting the first planet to rubble and then blasting the second soon after.