Jiro, I think at some point you need to be realistic and recognize that fans also hold a great deal of responsibility for the way studios hype these kind of things. In regards to highly-anticipated sequels, development studios are put in no-win situations when deciding the timing of announcing a game that is nowhere near completion of its development cycle.

If they announce something too soon, like Square Enix has done with Kingdom Hearts III, fans are upset when there's no follow-up news because they're too early in the development cycle. If they wait to announce things, like Valve has done with Half-Life 3, the fans get that hype train going on their own and the company is under endless scrutiny regarding the title anyway.

We do this to ourselves. No matter what the developers do, the hype trains will happen. They may stoke the fires, but we're the ones who go a pour kerosene all over 'em.