Back then, I think he has someone telling him “no” and filling out the rest of the game with sensible stuff.
Now, he just throws ideas at the wall (see en.wikipedia.org/…/Curiosity:_What's_Inside_the_C… ) and sees what sticks. Since he went on his own, he hasn’t fully delivered a single game, and the ideas are wacky at best and horrible at worst.
And unlike Hello Games, when Molyneux overpromises, he doesn’t spend years implementing every promised feature.
BTW, the exaggeration goes all the way back to Fable, the launch of which was plagued by lies that Molyneux and his team told about the state of the game and the features it would have. That doesn’t mean it wasn’t a great game, just that it wasn’t what he promised.