That's what i was getting at, i think. Imo, it is fine to treat the brain as a time bomb, provided there was stronger antagonist character (a stronger gortash, or orin, or whatever). They are more relatable and more interesting than a giant talking brain.
The impact of the act 3 antagonists (Gorthas/Orin) gets epitomized perfectly if you side with Gortash and he just randomly dies to a stroke when you face the Absolute.
They could have turned the Emperor into a fully fledged antagonist trying to usurp the Brain after you've done all the work for him and it would have been more interesting because then you'd at least have an actual villain with plans and motivations who was developed over the course of the the entire game. Instead we get this half-assed "you force my hand I join the brain" plot point that turns him into another NPC you one-shot on the first turn of the fight.
As it stands, you're not even fighting the Brain, just some mindflayers and a random mind-controlled dragon. It all just feels so disjointed and meaningless. There are no interactions between any of the characters and the only "meaningful" choice you make happens before you even go fight the brain. And even that choice - to squid or not to squid - is completely inorganic and disconnected from the rest of the game's narrative and choices so it feels like they included it at the last moment as some half-measure to add any sort of stakes to the encounter.
It's just kinda bewildering to me when people claim BG3 as this new "Gold Standard" for RPGs when one of the most important parts of an RPG (namely its story) is so utterly lacklustre. It's even a step down from Divinity Original Sin 2 and that game's main focus sure as hell wasn't its narrative.
