The fact that gnomes, mages, interactive terrain, etc were not going to be in the game has been stated for several months now. You'll still have access to the Sorceror, Barbarian, and Monk though, and up until BG2 this was a huge addition.

Now, the point made about the game never being released definitely isn't substantiated. I actually just spoke with a Ubi Soft PR person yesterday on the phone and she assured me the game would be in stores in September (yes, it's no longer end of August). They were sending out press information yesterday as I was talking to her, so I can't imagine they'd be sending that out if the game was indeed vaporware.

All in all, I think that PoR is still going to be a great game, regardless of the ommissions and delays. How can a 3rd Edition AD&D game in 3D be bad? =)