Wait, people are actually starting to construct copium narratives where evil woke Paradox suddenly and inexplicably demand that Game Which Was Coming Along Fine not only be re-written - but changed from the ground up - despite the massive costs incurred for a company operating successfully in an ultracompetitive space by pushing out games, many in a dubious state of completion, because it was not pozzed enough? Are you mentally stuck in 2013 where Brian Fargo is still able to convince people that Bad Games happen due to Evil Publishers, or did you just fall in the pot full of copium as kids like some Current Year neckbeard version of Obelix?
People. If a profit-hungry, capable and experienced corporation throws 20 million down the trash chute and fires everyone it’s not because the publisher of Empire of Sin, Crusader Kings and Imperator thought the game had too few transsexual toreadors.
It’s because Mitsoda was once again directing an unfinished, unstable, unsustainable and unsalvageable production pipeline which frankly should surprise literally fucking no one given that’s exactly what happened with every single project of his so far - be it Bloodlines, New Jersey, Deadstate or Alpha Protocol (where he, incidentally, was also given the boot and all his content scrapped - according to himself:
...for good or ill, I have nothing to do with
Alpha Protocol as it is being developed currently. I was working on the creative direction, story, and dialogue for previous iterations of the game, but outside of a dialogue system I created (before
Mass Effect was announced) for an earlier version of the game, my (and Annie Carlson’s) original dialogue and plot – again, for good or ill – are not being used for the game. Any characters I’m attributed with creating bear only a superficial resemblance to the ones in my original story.
).
This circumstantial theory seems to fit quite well with the empirical fact that, oh, the team was showing close to 0 progress deep into development.
This man isn’t worthy of your apologism in 2022 just because he had a hand in making a masterpiece 20 years ago. If anything, he deserves your contempt for screwing up the chance to make another, like the inept cocksucker he obviously is.