Sounds right to me. Game still in development, has another year, just showing progress, trailer had no sound effects (that should have been a indicater) Things like facial animations are done when voice overs are done.

See this is just a bad PR decision. If environments were what was done, keep that squarely in focus. Don't focus in on characters and story scenes when you have next to no finished facial animations.

We have remember -

A small team is working on this game. They dont have the luxury of a large team that can do everthing at once. Example: SE has already stated that the cutscense/Voice work  for FF7R nearing completion thougg the actual game is far from finished; that's because a separate team is focusing on that. They must continue to give updates so that backers aren't left in the dark. While SE has a big enough team to release media without the game being anywhere close to done, Ys net doesn't. The environments, model quality, and body animation were the focus of that trailer. There is a reason why there was no sound - because voice work isnt done, so if voice work isnt done they have nothing to model the faces to.

Why would they have removed the facial animations?

Because they're not done or not "exceptionally" done. 

I thought that was obvious. It's an impressive teaser, I hope it grabs the attention for new backers.

That's a relief. As I understand the character models weren't final either. Given the game is supposed to come out in 2018, I'm still a tad worried, but if the facial expressions are fixed then the models won't bother me so much. I just hope that if this game needs a delay, it'll get a delay.

Still think this has a good chance of becoming a train wreck. Though not before it's gonna be delayed many times.

I wasn't criticizing what's been done.  I'm criticizing the poor PR decision which is what it is.  I am very well acquainted with the limitations of a small team.

"Game Watch Impress: The audio is wonderful, and is it a new recording?
Suzuki: No. This still uses audio from Shenmue II."

awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwkkkkkkkkwarddddddddd