The article seems to not talk about the difference between game designers and game developers which seem quite relevant in this context. It is even explictly naming "developers" in companies but using it wrong in context, it isn't a game developer's job to come up with a novel idea, that would be the company game designer. (Though people might fill both roles). To most people the amount of changes a a publishing company makes will be quite surprising, it will change a lot to everything about a game if it arrives by an author's submission and is gonna hit the market. The author might have submitted a novel idea and interesting core, but the raw games are often bad in pacing, balance, scoring, emotional engagement and the most people would just dismiss them. Good developers will be able to turn the interesting bit into a good game and dismiss the rest.