Having played a good portion of Daikatana with a big fix-up mod, I'd say it's one of those games where there's a good game trying to get out and would have been

Having played a good portion of Daikatana with a big fix-up mod, I'd say it's one of those games where there's a good game trying to get out and would have been a great if it released in a better state - but it didn't. However it's really hard to see how any commercial project could do an overhaul/remake to try and explore that potential and not deal with that baggage. Probably similar for Duke Nukem Forever, if that had been a well run project instead of a 14 year saga, it seems like the poison is being a bit drunk on earlier success and having too much money available without accountability for it.