Owlcat Games Pathfinder wrath of the rightous, Gladitor Guild Manager, Solasta, Ashes of Creation, Hearthstone where regular community updates are posted weekly off the top of my head. There are other examples as well. The community managers of those games all do release regular weekly/bi-weekly updates to progress in the game incase of hearthstone its not really an EA game but its a game that has a smaller staff despite being for a much larger company overall. The lead developer Dean Ayala Interacts with the community once every single week via twitter and replies to the community with updates news ect on upcoming content and answers several dozen questions in Q&A. The pathfinder team from owlcat does a weekly stream update on you tube and interacts with the community.

Steamworks even defines it differently. It is not Alpha, it is not Beta.
"Early Access is a tool to develop your game with the community by giving them access to your title before it is officially released."
Even by Steam works rules, they cannot promise things that are not in EA release that may/may not meet future expectations.

Approximately how long will this game be in Early Access?
“Though Act 1 (the content for Early Access) is defined, Act’s 2 and 3 are work in progress. It’s therefore difficult to predict when 1.0 will launch. We anticipate Baldur’s Gate 3 being in Early Access for at least one year but we’ll have to see how it goes. It’ll be ready when it’s ready.”

it does say act 1 only thats a copy past right from the steam page however again 1 year noted in the post.

What is the current state of the Early Access version?
“The Early Access version of Baldur’s Gate 3 includes Act 1 of the game which, in one playthrough, is approximately 25 hours of self-contained content. 6 player classes are supported and 9 races/subraces with more to be added later. There are 5 origin characters which you can recruit (but not play as for now). Most of Baldur’s Gate 3’s advertised features are included though some are still work in progress. Not every language is currently supported, as our writers are still developing the game which makes translation difficult.

Again copy paste - Note the more to be added later quote.

We’ve worked hard to release an Early Access version that feels complete, fun to play, and has as little stub (unfinished) content as possible. There are bugs and there will be changes to content (often based on player feedback), but our goal is to already now give you something that’s genuinely fun to play.”

Note again there will be changes to the content added based on feedback.

How are you planning on involving the Community in your development process?
“Since day one of Baldur's Gate 3’s announcement, community discussion, feedback, and organization (thank you) has shaped what we’ve said and done. Though we have a strong vision for the game throughout our team of over 300 people, our goal is to create a game that gets our audience excited, and to maintain a healthy relationship with those who take the time to provide feedback and help us create a better game. We use automatic data collection tools to help us better balance the game but we also listen to forum feedback and use that to drive internal debate. We create massive, sprawling games, and we couldn’t possibly explore every single permutation and combination of skills, choices, reactions and conclusions without our community. Working with your thoughts, feedback, and behaviour helps us to better understand how our ideas are toyed with, and how we can improve things.”

Note again healthy relationship and listening to forum feedback there is a lack of response to most feedback or interaction with community which that is all directly quoted of the steam forums. Which has been expressed alot by the community. While there are people who have played maybe 30-50 hours in game play in some cases but if you go and read the steam reviews all the negative reviews are generally the same lack of interaction or a particular bug that makes the game unplayable for that person. If you look at the positive reviews majority of them are by people with a low number of hours invested into the game not all of them but a majority of them you looking at 20-40 hours of time on the game.

- Your throwing a comparison of interaction Larion is losing that argument heavily when compared to the competition. When there direct competitors in CRPG time lines are interacting weekly/Bi-weekly in streams with the community and you compare that directly to them where we get a couple comments after a patch is posted and nothing for several months later its a bad reflection.

But again I am not knocking the game I am just stating releasing it as EA with expectations that were set. I would not recommend anyone get the early access version of the game as I posted in my review on steam because there communication is poor. At same time I also stated that I do think the game will probably be much better at full release but there poor communication which can directly be compared to there competitors would make me recommend the competition over them when looking at getting a game in early access weather the full version is better or not. The rate at which the content is being release they have already said will be longer than 2021 so there is no way they will make the OCT 6 deadline of 1 year still listed on the steam early access information. Which should actually be updated as well technically as its misleading.

I would not hold them to that however the other stuff such as regular updates and interacting with the community I would hold them to as that is a showing of good faith. I actually wouldnt be suprised to see WoTC change companies in the future when releasing games down the road. Neverwinter Online which is a horrible game even patched content 1 week following the release of Van Richtens guide to Ravenloft to add content into there game related to the recient book release. Which shows the thoughts you would expect to see them expecting from Larion with how content for the game comes out as well.

If you want a direct comparison go look up pathfinder wrath of the righteous on the steam news and announcements and compare it directly to BG3 as they are directly competing games in comparison you talking you never see 2 weeks without an update. BG3 last news or announcements were in February there is your direct comparison. June 2nd may 25th may 22nd may 21st may 20th may 12th off top of my head were last updates posted on it. its not knocking larion as bg 3 on full release due to the 5e system itself should be a better balanced game compared to 3.5 dnd and bg3 is a much nicer looking game so if done well it could be much better overall but when you compare the rate at which you get updates and content and what you get for the early access direct comparison WoTR is kicking the snot out of them. Having played both games in EA as well as Solasta. WOTR is the clear leader at the moment. When the games originally released I would have given BG3 the better review.

Currently In CRPG direct competition at the moment your looking at POE:2, PF:WoTR, Solasta and BG3. I haven't played POE:2 and solasta because it will not release all the classes cant beat BG3 assuming it releases all the classes in its current state at full release. However WoTR kicks it in the teeth and asks if it would like another which if you were gonna spend money and had bought not bought any of the games is where I would say spend your money currently till bg3 hits its full release and we see how they stack up against each other. My initial review would have put bg3 in the lead but having both games for 6 months + of EA I would give pathfinder the advantage.