Oh, I've definitely seen them where the game has gone like that and led to massive delays (e.g., Jessica O'Neill's) or losing control of all the paths and options (e.g., TACOS) - though of course I can't say that's the sole reason in either case. Generally, I also feel that they tend to lose their shine a bit once all the boundaries have come down.
Personally though, I don't think longer = better and I definitely don't think shorter = worse. We're talking the number of updates as well, not the size of those updates. Here, we're getting a good amount of story in each update (small sample size so far, of course), and it's also kinetic, so it's easier there too, as there aren't the multiple paths to track. I don't think we're seeing "compaction" here - though again we don't know how the remaining updates will go. I have no concerns on that front, based on what I've seen so far.