The way it currently works does encourage degenerate gameplay (retreating to safe rooms or areas where one can shake him off), and indeed makes him more often than not an annoyance rather than a challenge, but that is not, then, because he is on the player's trail too often, but rather not often enough. Were he a more persistent pursuer, he would be more likely to catch the player in those situations in which he is genuinely dangerous (e.g. where there are other enemies).
One way they could do this is by having him patrol the area outside the safe rooms rather than have him leave, plus making it harder for him to lose the player's trail. They could then prevent this from being a total block on player exploration by adding specific environmental hazards that the player can activate in order to incapacitate him for a while (maybe 15 minutes or so, longer than his normal 'stun', in any case). This would differ from the current shake off tactics in that it would be better balanced and integrated into the level design. This they could do by making it so that the player has to survive certain hostile areas to get to the hazards, or better yet, requiring the player to actually fight the tyrant into a 'stun' in order to activate the hazards, while also having the battle area where you are supposed to down him be tight like in the elevator fight.
Had they implemented it like that they would have been able to remain more faithful to the original, while also implementing the 'emergent' aspect more fully. Heck, they could even have had him drop loot if you incapacitate him in the 'special' way, thus restoring the risk/reward element. I just feel that, as it stands, the feature seems unfinished and it probably would have been less of a hassle if they had just done it the old way. Perhaps they didn't really understand the design conundrum into which they got themselves by implementing this, and in the end it turned out they didn't have the time to really work out all of the kinks.
If they are really going to commit to this approach going forward, they should start finding solutions to these issues, because if X can't create challenge, tension, and unpredictability, there is really no point for him being implemented in the way he is. Perhaps they saw him, in part, as a good chance for a Nemesis test run. Let's just hope they are able flesh the mechanic out when the latter's time comes.
As I said in one of my previous posts, I am overall ambivalent about this aspect of the game, and a lot of its potential was unfulfilled. It did work as intended at times, and when it did, it was worth it. I also had a lot of fun with the mechanic the first time around, as it did create tension. But it does get weaker on replays and it says something that most of the best encounters with him are scripted. Definitely one of those areas with room for improvement.
