Game-breaking bugs were fixed. There always will be some minor ones in a game this big, and owlcats do fix them religiously, I have to give them that. Considering the last DLC was delayed 1 month from now it's up to if you want to pick the game up now or wait for that one.
Bugs are really iffy theme really as it varies greatly from one person to the next. I never had a lot of issues with the game(mainly because I installed cleaner mod the moment it released and never parted with it) and some claim to have trouble even launching it. It's difficult to tell how much of that is trolling/potato PC/strange config issues.

It still apear not very serious, such as already when we create a character, some bonus are left blank in the end,
but at least what's important is that they appear in the main game.

Thanks for the detailed responses! Sounds like a bit of a gamble on some minor issues, but the game is mostly playable. Might finally give it a shot. :]

Cleaner mod sounds interesting, I'll try that out if I run into issues!

Run it from day 1. There are no downsides and once you feel the full force of save bloat it will be too late to fix anything.

I don't know if I like the idea of removing things from the game if I can live with it still being there, lol. But if it's a huge problem, maybe I should... I'll definitely give it some thought.

Game running perfectly since beginning for me, but installed it first time in 2019 with patches. notices only minor bugs like hud glitches that go away quickly. Game's great, no question for me

Is this still the case, and which version are you running?

This also interests me. Been eyeing this game for a while but decided not to buy it given the reaction. Still has a lot of mixed reviews on Steam too. Still has bugs, unbalanced, unforgiving supposedly. And some (most?) quests are timed supposedly?

Can anyone expound on this? Hopefully objectively.

edit: and does this game have romance?

It still has bugs, but most of the egregious ones have been squashed. It is unbalanced and unforgiving, especially for people not used to Pathfinder rules. Timed? The whole game is time based, though at least that seems to be in ample supply. There is romance, but not in-depth.

Depending on what you refer to as unbalanced. The game is easily beatable on normal/challenging with sub-optimal party. As to how sub-optimal said party will be.. That's another question. There is no limit to how badly you can screw up your characters and would be impossible to balance around.

Kingdom management has numbers all over the place and is geared towards lawful characters with bulletin boards everywhere that take care to stay above the expected curve all the time. Otherwise it's a total suffer. That IS unbalanced.

Really? Reviews gave me the impression that you get punished for not meeting certain time limits. One review talks about needing to do some quest on a Monday, given that theres no (obvious?) calendar. Either way, the player had to rest several days, etc., compromising other quests.

I personally don't like being hurried in RPGs. At least not to the point you miss out on the world and story.

Even the most recent reviews say that the game necessitates min-maxing, to variable degrees, even on easier difficulties. Which is fine, no problem with that.

So what Im getting is that bigger bugs, issues are gone and the game is playable. That said, the game design/mechanics isnt for everyone.

Maybe Ill get this somewhere down the a line when it inevitably comes out with an enhanced or game of the year edition with all the bells and whistles.

Most reviewers are not gamers. And most of them just repeat what others said. Truth is if you are adept enough at PF to build a party that would survive combat-heavy AP - it would be fine on normal/challenging. Extreme min/max is only needed for unfair.
min/max character will be about 5-10% better at everything he does than average dude. That is assuming picking perfect feats.
As for the build itself... Normal/challenging does not require perfectly made build with meta knowledge attached so long as you use spells and abilities competently.

DnD in general is not for everyone. Kingmaker is a combat-heavy AP that was in many respects harder than the game you've got. Story/Easy have mob stats lower than they would be in PnP, cuts out many mechanics like stat damage and game showers you in magic items. If someone can't beat the game on easy they should not play DnD period. RP or not.
And yes, it must be possible to screw up so bad you lose the game. What's the point of the game you can't lose?

I wouldnt say that, tempting as it would be. And by reviews, I don't mean ~20-hour gameplay ones. A lot of the negative reviews come from people who've played over 80, a hundred hours, etc. And some of these are long, well-written, some specific. So for someone to take the time to play a game and write a seemingly comprehensive review only for said review to not recommend it should bear weight. Especially to someone like me, admittedly I don't have the timesink to metagame anymore. My take is that I just want to have fun, experience the story, lose battles, but not have to tear your hair out to make things work, make things fun - which some comments seem to imply.

And by everyone, I meant people who play cRPGs. I was in a hurry when I wrote that. Again, talking about reviews, the impression is that Baldurs Gate was hard - not for everyone, challenging but it was fun. This game seems to be unfair.

That said, Ive also read on some of your builds too so it goes without saying you know the game almost inside out. So the insight is worth noting and appreciated. Maybe I'll let it develop a bit. Devs look like theyre really active with the community.

easy is not the way I'd describe it. Manageable would be the word.
Also I am usually able to pinpoint what whoever asks does wrong. But general 'git gud' sometimes is the answer. Some people just can't accept they do need buffs and reasonable spell/feat selection along with a bit of micro to go through the game comfortably. There are also "I've played all RPG's on hardest difficulty blind for 20 years and refuse to go lower" types. The latter are much worse than just new guys and can't be really helped.