Thank you
@RalliX , this is really close what we had experienced.
I will try to write something about these topics, its hard to talk about these complex topics with my weak English but will try sorry for grammer mistakes or wrong wordings at the end important thing is understanding and sharing key points and we can do it somehow.
I can say that anybody at top of TW are not focused on getting more money with giving players something not good. Thats why development took so much time. I understand your frustrations. However hype was always ready to rise. Its hard to slow it down or reduce. Even now sometimes we talk about a basic feature in forum (fe. war reasons) then there become big expectations. Then I have to write "please do not expect something big - it is not game changer" to slow down expectations. I cannot defend weak communication of top but they are not scammers. Armagan is a good person I do not know why he does not prefer communication during EA but he is not a guy focused on making more money, he is well educated and trustful person which are rare to find around these days. I understand your situation when you cannot see enough communication from him - I also feel same like you - become like you lost one of your closest friends. I am not happy with this direction and I also criticized even at forum. However I want to underline that I really do not understand or can defend halting his communication with players - probably its because no time remains for that after company grows too much.
Money is something meaningless after some point. Reputation is more important. Even 1M$ is enough for living in good conditions in all your life without working. He can take maybe 10x of this money after Warband's success and can live happily ever. It is hard to create a product which will make end users mostly happy especially after a sequal of a successfull product. You should always think about your project during day and night and you should spend your life for it even you should not spend enough time with your family. Otherwise it can be hard to understand what players want or need. In Warband he communicated players much and this yield with a higher ratio of end user happiness. However it is easy to do if you are indie company and if you have lots of energy, ambitions and dreams. After company grows you need to deal lots of other boring stuff so time remained to player communication reduces. This can reduce your product's gameplay. This can reduce happiness of community. In that point you should give some of your power to others and split responsibilities - however this is not done at TW. Also probably it seems ambition reduces after a success is gained - maybe related to human nature.
After all these points that's why I also want to take some long rest first (maybe half / one year) get away from computer and spend time on different hobbies free my mind & travel (we are coming to life once, money is less important - life is more important) then create a small indie company later and will try to focus on smaller projects with focusing on perfect gameplay. I do not believe things can change here, feel like it's good time to create a new way.
In addition we had several unlucky situations in last 10 years. For example we are living in a country which has really beautiful climate and geography and cultural mixture however it is not managed by good people. We had even coup in 2015, we had gezi resistance in 2013 which most of our devs also attended. All these was also fault of government then government used that coup to increase pressure over opponent press members or politicans. So we devs always think about what should we do in future because justice system and freedom of press and education systems went worse in last 20 years here. While coding here I always think also how things would be sorted out. I do not want to leave my country to bad politicans we want to save here from them. In short our brains are not relaxed and its hard to focus on projects. At least mine but I believe there are many others. Democracy is a good system but if politicians controls also media it is so easy to manupilate most of country and get needed votes at elections. So all young educated generation here is trying to go abroad and save themselves and their next generations. My friends at same college are 90% at abroad currently. So quality of all products also human quality reduces. This is something really bad for TW also. Because it will be more and more hard to find quality devs if Turkey cannot save itself from current government.
Also Covid-19 effected us badly too imo. Of course it increased sales (timing of EA release was only a luck, EA release date was determined before Covid outbreak) however I prefer working in office all together with other devs. Discussing game features face to face is always better.
In short I reject Bannerlord is a grift. TW is not a company trying to sell players scam (at least until now - I cannot know what will happen future). However in current direction and conditions it will be hard to create perfect projects in future - this is only guess, I am not talking about ok projects, of course these can be produced. Thats why I want to create a new way to myself also. There are more reasons which I cannot tell public ofc, not everything was perfect, I also had lots of disapointments. However just note that managers are not bad people or scammers. After college finished at 2008, I worked for bad people who prioritize money before TW so I know how they are like. At the end of first year I could not continue that and past TW because most important thing is creating projects with people you trust, believe and have similar importances / characteristic. There are too many rich but bad people in world and they use potential / clever / educated / ambitious people to rise more. Its frustrating to work for these people. TW was not a place like that. We worked here to rise good people and they succeed this (with the additional and so important helps of Warband modders also, they created tons of mods with no financial expectations).
Also thank you all for your all support you give. TW is a lucky company which have really devoted fans. I know why you criticize much. You see TW from your family or like a friend you know for long time and you want us to be successful and use all potential game has.
(Bloc reis kızma steamde yani)