This. This is why I've always stressed the human component in design. Players need more than numbers and gameplay; they want to feel.
I always thought Subnautica's success was surprising; I bought a copy of it for my favorite little person when we had a computer that could (just barely) handle it well, and it was fascinating to see how they got from A to B and reached success.
I loved that they opened up their SVN and uploaded daily builds; I'll definitely keep that in mind for my own projects; I generally prefer fast updates when I'm patching, but not so much during the process.