IMO the current game still would have been great if I didn’t revamp it, but it would’ve taken much more time to get to a good point + some of the issues I mentioned would have persisted potentially forever.
Your points on removing certain features that make the game unique are correct, and they will be missed, but I don’t think people should be all that sad about them, since they’ll be replaced with new features that add just as much uniqueness. (storyline, cutscenes, influential dialog choices, more unique NPCs, better side quests since they will be hand-made and not random, etc.)