The problem has never been how skilled or dedicated the devs are, and the fact people focused their ire on them when 2.2 released was a problem unto itself. The real issue is stellaris has since release had massive holes in performance, balance problems, and incomplete features being left for years or scrapped for more of the same in the hope they get fixed down the line(just like the problems they replaced). All the while the technical dept and feature creep has piled higher and higher while the same small team plays catch up trying to squash these issues before more get added.
Just look at this quote from the AI logic thread:
The same small team that has struggled to implement the base features of the game and keep up with the added work load since has not had any increase in size despite stellaris being one of paradox's most financially successful games. Despite all the money it has made they don't seem to have had any increases in budget to address the problems they have acknowledged numerous times in dev diaries.
Stellaris and its expansions have been top sellers multiple times since release but the money seems to go more towards acquiring new IP's and developing new titles or console editions while they continue to milk the old IPs without much reinvestment in what made them that money to begin with. I love the free updates we get, and the fact they still have a team working on this game 3 years down the line, but I feel that is the bare minimum they can do considering how much money they make from this game and it's DLC.
This is an article quoting the new PDX CEO, Ebba Ljungerud, this summer, saying "We've released crappy games in the past, many years ago. I know how it is to release buggy, unfinished games. I don't want to do that anymore."
They do not seem to have followed through with this, when 5 months later they rush an expansion out for Christmas Sales when they knew the state they were launching it. This is not the first time stellaris has had poor launches or problems that Wiz addressed in dev diaries do not get enough follow through, and it is starting to chip away at the goodwill they have established through long term support of their games.
I'm just seeing a huge disconnect between what we are told paradox as a company is aware of as issues and them allocating enough time and money towards fixing them, which is a problem for those above the devs to solve. It seems clear the dev team dedicates a lot of passion and effort into this game, but their best doesn't seem to be enough and I think they really need to look at increasing the size of the team if they insist on increasing the scope and complexity of the game moving forwards.
