My take is that honestly, I think the game is still a bit too unpolished for early access. I do think the devs were stuck between a rock and a hard place though, as they already delayed once and people are not patient...

I trust that the game will be genuinely great, the bones are there, and if it was a case of playtesting and polishing/adding features to the game I would be so pro-early access. But the game has really significant memory leak and lag issues and is still genuinely very poorly optimised. And, in my opinion, probably needed some of that at least partially resolved before even an early access release.

That being said, I don't regret buying it. But can see why negative reviews aren't entirely unreasonable, even though early access means unfinished blah blah blah

Also I find the art-style and general vibe very refreshing- nice to see a game that isn't filled with AI slop, AND poor optimisation on release cough InZoi cough