I've played the game in the last 3-4 months I guess already about 30 times on TTS (Tabletop Simulator - there is a mod, it's just not public... maybe at some point in the future) with a range of 3-5 players. Obviously TTS is not helpful in regards to the paranoia factor, since you don't really see the other peoples reactions, can't look in their eyes and all that... It's limited to their voice, which makes it way more difficult to get behind if someone is acting human or not. Also, TTS adds a lot of playtime, just because the same actions in TTS take (I don't know) 3-4x times as long to do, but still, we had great fun to date with it.
About the Helicopter Phase and the helicopter roll: Apart from that I don't understand why the few seconds of maybe rolling a dice at the end of the game would kill the fun people hopefully had the hours before up to that point... If everyone is doing their job and only letting the humans on the helicopter, there is not even the need to roll a single die. If everyone is doing their job and they let a thing on board, it depends on the thing. If a strong thing got on board (many helicopter bonuses) the humans again maybe don't even have to roll (because they have lost anyway since they can't reach the required goal anymore, independent of their helicopter rolls) or have slim/decent chances (depending on the humans bonuses found), while with a weak thing (few or no helicopter bonuses) the humans either still don't have roll or have still very good chances... Sooo, the better a job the humans have done from start (finding helicopter bonuses and staying alive before the helicopter round) to finish (any things on board the helicopter?), the less the chances of any helicopter roll even being necessary. I really think of all the games I've played, with 70-80% a roll wasn't even necessary or almost impossible to fail. Either way, nobody ever was bothered if the roll won or lost the game for them. It was more about the journey to that point end the whole discussion who to let on board the helicopter then...
And about the price: I don't understand how people can say it's only a card game if they looked into that a little closer. And with all the KS update (videos) I certainly don't get the feel of it being overpriced or anything like that. It has great production value. The components, the insert, anything seems to be right up there... Yeah, a Gloomhaven for example has more components, but it's not just about quantities, but obviously initially one of the main things someone recognizes...
I've also bought "The Thing ... Outpost 31" and have played that a few times too in the meantime with I think 4, 5 and 7 players.
Commenting on these two games in comparison with only a few words I would say, WGT? is already a good & fun survival game, it has gameplay mechanics and interaction which works without all that paranoia, and the growing paranoia is more the icing on the cake. Different with The Thing, which doesn't have much gameplay really, there is at least 1 thing from the get go and the thing has no control at all if and who else gets infected throughout the game, and the game seems to fully rely on the paranoia factor. If you take away the whole paranoia in both games... WGT? is still a good co-op survival game, while in The Thing there is not much left if you ask me.
Now, if you feel like giving the TTS mod of WGT? a shot, and maybe that at least can convince any of you in regards to gameplay, join us on Discord (a couple of the Certifiable Studios guys are active on there too): https://discord.gg/kZcSRqE
I've also heard that there will be a "Round One" with Man vs Meeples at some point this week with a production copy and 2 of the guys of Certifiable Studios, so maybe watch out for that one too if you are interested...