To be true evolved Arthron shield is larger and more resistant. 
Too bad that current system is quite random and thus not really predicable, thus hard to spot as real evolution.
I wouldn’t say it is false advertising, but advertising for sure. A very clever way to say: mutations are random and evolution gives enemies more HP. So yeah, while I wouldn’t be so harsh as OP I wouldn’t say how game is/was advertised is 100% true and reflects in-game content.
But to be honest, there is no reason to praise developer for responding to criticism because it is all about implementing stuff they have promised during crowdfunding raise. 
We can (and should) be happy it will be implemented in the game in some form at some point, but it is hard to get rid of impression it wouldn’t if we weren’t so critital about it.
If something is advertised as one of the main and brightest features of a game, it SHOULD feel like that in the end. It’s that simple. Whenever I’m not sure I (and/or my team) manage to do something to be one of the unique things in my product, then I don’t advertise it that way, otherwise people believe that I have a knowledge/resources/capabilities to do that.
So there are some evolution elements in the game for sure but not in the way everyone expected.
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I don’t see much point in either praising nor admonishing them. If they did the best they could, that who can really blame them? If they conned the players, what’s the use for throwing insults? It’s not like they would feel a remorse now.
It was stated that game is to be supported for two years, so the most productive thing seems to me, is to assume very best intention on the part of the developers, provide any feedback that I think could be useful and hope that the game will improve to my liking.
As to my satisfaction as a consumer, it can only really influence, whenever I will be willing to invest money into Snapshot’s projects in the future.
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In those two years something else in TBS genre may emerge, better and maybe more ambitious than PP could ever be, so everyone forget about this game. I still dream of proper successor of JG’s X-Com - a horror strategy game with decent graphics, dense atmosphere and a gameplay similar to that game.
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I am far from throwing insults. I do feel conned a bit for many different reasons but I refrain from going full negative because it doesn’t make sense. I hope one day I’ll get the game I wished for, one way or another (modding support). I just want to point out the fact that while listening to criticism is definitely good thing, its value depends on why did criticism occured in a first place.
@UnstableVoltage I asked some questions in this topic that I got no answers for. I know that some of then go beyond this topic, but I would rather not create a new one just to ask them.
I would like to ask you why shadows are barely visible on particular grounds?
I ask this question because this has confused me. I have not to play your game in a while, looked at that first demo you have published, and I jumped to the game to check the shadow situation, looked at your playthrough for conformation and bad luck, I checked it on those unfortunate maps in both cases. I accused the game that there is no shadow on the characters, it turned out that this is not true, for what I I apologize. But it is clear that on some maps there are bearly visible, and you can find them only if you are really trying.
For what purpose have you made Fort Freiheit demo? What was the purpose of taking it to PC Gamer Weekender, and What was the purpose of putting it on your official Youtube channel?
You have mentioned that this demo was made for PC Gamer Weekender, and you had not had a map generator ready at that time, and everything was fixed there, and you could arrange the scenery manually. Now, you seem to be upset when someone compere that demo to the released over 5 months ago game. As I see it, you have made this dame for marketing purposes even such as PC Gamer Weekender can give. You used those materials to advertise your game in my opinion, This was the first real contact your customers had wit your game, and expecting from your them now that they should not expect such level of visual experience over 2 years after because you had said that this is subject to changes, is an unfair and customer-hostile practice in my opinion.
My last question was about Adaptive Evolution. You, as Snapshot Games, have annexed this type of feature from the beginning of the fig campaign, and many times after that on such occasions like interviews. Even now this is the first feature o site of your game on Epic.
Mutating Alien Menace: Face down an ever-changing alien threat that adapts to your tactics and offers no respite even as your team becomes more powerful and technologically advanced.
I have asked why are you advertising your game with features, that do not exist. Now I think, that I could put it better. I do not know if Adaptive Evolution does not exist in the game, but it surely does not work as intended. I would like to extend my question.
-Is there Adaptive Evolution in the game in any form you have announced on multiple occasions?
-Do you plan to implement it, if it is not part of the game?
-Why are you using this feature on your Epic site, if it clearly not work as intended?
I ask these questions because Adaptive Evolution was one of the selling points of your game, and you have mentioned it on multiple occasions, and as far as I’m, aware fo that, you have not withdrawn form this idea.
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Anything related to the visuals (including shadows and lighting) received changes over time due to refinements and optimisations.
It’s fairly easy to make a small demo run “ok” on a small selection of hardware - but as the game becomes larger and more complex, and it’s required to run “well” on the widest range of hardware, visual fidelity has to be fine-tuned.
We couldn’t have known, 2 years ago with the earlier backer builds, what the finished product would look like.
Those early Backer Builds (which in a way, the PC Gamer Weekender demo was a very early prelude to Backer Build One) were made for our crowdfunding customers to see how development was progressing. A peek behind the curtain, if you will.
Yes, we wanted to raise awareness of the game’s development, and these demos allowed people to get a taste of the gameplay. They were never about setting an expectation for the visual look of the final product, as we could never be certain how that would be 2 years down the line. This is why we always said that it wasn’t representative of the final product. You may not like it, but that’s just how things are. Not just in the video game industry, but in many fields where products are prototyped and developed over time. They change. The end result is not always the same as the concepts or prototypes.
Anyone making a product has 2 broad choices:
Show nothing until the product is complete or near complete - that way, no one has any of the work in progress prototypes or concepts to compare it to.
or
Show the development of the product publicly. Because Phoenix Point was crowdfunded, and because backers would be getting access to the development builds and sharing videos/streams etc, there was no reason for us not to show the in-development builds at shows.
As for adaptive evolution: Yes, it is included in the game. As the player scores victories against the Pandorans, they evolve into different mutations to try and counter the player’s strategies. However, mutation combinations are specific to each Pandoran Nest. So a specific Nest will always have a specific set of mutations, which is decided randomly when the Nest is generated (after all, evolution is nothing more than random mutations which succeed). As new Nests spawn, they will have evolved into something else.
We’re making a change to this to reduce the randomness that the evolutions have. It won’t be quite as dynamic, but it will allow us to better control the balance by having certain mutations appear in a certain order and at certain points in the game. However, the Pandorans will still only get to evolve into these mutations once certain conditions have been met (for example - once a certain amount of Pandoran damage to the player has been negated by the player armor, the Pandorans will get the option to evolve to have mutations which remove/bypass armor).
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It’s fine, and whatever happens it’s definitely worth the price paid, remember it was only £30