Everquest 2: Steve "Moorgard" Danuser responds to complaints about Character Creation.

talking about art, design, mechanics, audio, or whatever--is about choices. You
do not have infinite resources because the finished game has to actually work
and be playable. Even when dealing with the level of system requirements we
have, there are decisions to be made about where you want to spend those
resources.

Our character models don't exist in a vacuum. They have to function in an online
world full of detailed landscapes, pathing data, complex animations, and ambient
audio triggers. Because of that, the models must have limits placed on them.
This is a practical issue so that we end up with a game that is a lot of fun to
play, rather than a pretty tech demo that gets in the way of that gameplay.
Which, if you go so hog wild with detail that you bog down every computer system
available, is what's going to happen.

Let me be clear: our art team is capable of literally anything. They can make
models and landscapes as beautiful and detailed as any team of artists on the
planet--and I know that because I've seen them do it. To imply that they're lazy
because you don't like the way something looks is an unfair disservice to some
very talented people.

As great as it would be, game artists can't work without limits. Trust me, other
companies have tried just that and have met with costly failures. Limits have to
be imposed, or ultimately you won't end up with a playable product.

So while it's easy to look at a single aspect of game design and say "it would
be so simple to do it better," you need to look at the whole game design process
to really give such assertions a valid context. Every decision made when
building a game touches hundreds of other aspects, and all those elements have
to be weighed against each another.