““We were finally at a state in the project where we could play through the whole [game]. And it became very clear that we were missing the large final location that was going to tie the story together and have a satisfying action-filled payoff,” Shen said. “I was both implementing the main quest and leading the quest design team, so I had absolutely no time. The entire quest design team was already overbooked.””
The quest design team being overbooked and not having time certainly explains a lot.
@Ashtear @AreaKode No, but while I enjoyed it, I did wonder what the point of the flashbacks was. If (with our eyes opened to the Starborn) we had hit those flashbacks and could see we were being watched by the Pilgrim or something, that would have been interesting. If our dialogue choices with Vlad had some impact on the next or maybe second next NG+, that would have been cool.
The flashbacks felt like padding to me because they were, it turns out.