Absolutely. The more control, the worse it gets.
With completely open chargen, you wind up with the following archetypes:
-You get lucky and someone who knows the setting and mechanics actually puts in the work to write a compelling character. This one person drives the bandwagon, and others don't get much say over it for investment level. Aka the Earthscorpion/Tenfoldshields/Revlid write in solution. Single player presents masterwork vote that everyone else just follows.
-You get lucky and through a confluence of events, your players arrive at something sort of playable and compelling while trying to actually powergame(see Rose, who's a pretty powergamer build that grew into much more through circumstances and bandwagon drifting).
-Things work out in a confused mess that collapses into a character of sorts in one of several SV archetypes. Writer can work from here to actually give it depth.
-Things work out in a confused mess based on the mood of the day, which can give you things like a sufferingblob(see Ignition's Jade, who went all the way to being tortured for more power, and alternating between mad science, hamfisted attempts to cure her problems and burninating everything)
-Random factor in chargen gives you Interesting Times. See Illona, Frederick, etc. The dice decided to have fun and you just ride the dice monster.
-Someone introduces a stupid meme and the thread decides it's awesome in a fever. See Praising the Sun, Muscle Wizard, etc. VERY hard to pull a recovery, most such quests either go full crack or die.
Players are almost never concerned about making a viable story for the PC, and in the absence of the direct pursuit of the archetypical preference, will always seek more power/science.
