I feel like you don't get how complicated game design is.
Viewing post in Why is it taking so long for the update to be released?
for real, and the game just went from demo to pre-alpha, and it's still only the one main dev (afaik). Anyone who's tried to do a large scale creative project should know the goofing around/planning phase is far, far easier than even starting the actual project, and it can be absolutely crushing amounts of effort to keep at it
Tbf, sometimes CERTAIN GAMES have taken longer periods of waiting for mediocre updates (partially due to incompetent devs or engine / publisher issues)... So it's not like a fanbase is always entirely absentminded for daring to question their game-devs at all.
But in most other cases, this time included? Yeah, you're right on the money king.