I've gone on record saying that I find the emperor far more interesting to interact with than I ever did Daisy. I've said that if they had kept the previous approach to tadpole progression and consequences but just had emperor instead of daisy, then that would have been the best outcome, so that's just a place where we flatly disagree. As for Orpheus, I agree they wrote themselves into a corner but that doesn't mean they didn't put effort into the game, it just means they planned poorly and made bad decisions. Clearly the end of this game's development was a mess, and I'm sure you've experienced how much effort it takes to manage a mess. Am I saying any of this is at all good? Definitely not, the outcome is painfully lackluster. I'm just saying all of this because I don't think not putting in enough effort is the root cause of any of these problems. If any singular aspect of the game didn't have effort behind it, it's because that effort was put towards putting out a fire that probably could have been avoided.

However the point about a vision in cosntant flux not being a vision is very true, I'll concede that point entirely. Larian's problem really seem to be that they lack people who will say "no, iteration needs to stop, we have to nail things down now." That and they seem very married to the value of spectacle and "awesomeness" first and foremost. That's something I've believed since the beginning.