I agree. I personally feel like they chose the right configuration for the NSX...it's a baby 918 basically and in that way a fitting tribute to the original car in ethos. I don't think the original NSX was designed to be "analog" because what we know as analog today was the only way back then. In reality, the NSX had a very high level of technology - VTEC, aluminum unibody, etc.
The problem with the new car is that it wasn't impactful enough. I don't think they did a particularly good job marketing it. It was a little too middle-America and not enough Ayrton Senna. It takes effort to remember that the car even exists. I also don't think they did a particularly great job on the interior styling, it doesn't look like a supercar in there to me. If you compare it to the C8 (or C7 for that matter) it looks expensive. If you compare it to the 918, it looks like a bargain - I think they didn't do an adequate job of transmitting that message. All that being said, the original NSX didn't exactly fly off the shelves either - Acura's best year was under 2,000 units and most years were under 500 units, not much different from the new car. So maybe at the end of the day any NSX is going to be a niche product and we should be happy Honda decided to build it at all.
You mention "middle America" but nobody in middle America can afford it - it was priced solidly in supercar territory. And you're right that the interior isn't great but the GT-R's isn't either but they still sell several times as many as the NSX does despite what you believe was the "right configuration", i.e. hybrid technology. In fact, the GT-Rs sales remained stable through its first
eight model years. I think the proof that the NSX was the wrong configuration or wrong ethos is that it never sold anywhere near expectations - fewer than 1500 units and averaging a mere 277 a year. You're not giving the first NSX nearly enough credit because its sales arc was very similar to other hot but aging supercars, especially the R35. The new car's best year, 2017, beat the archaic GT-R by literally 3 cars at a time when the R35 was already
ten years old. In fact, I think the GT-R is its prime market competition, particularly the Nismo, and it continues to trounce the NSX's sales despite being virtually obsolete. You also mention the C8 - while the NSX is a more highly engineered machine, it doesn't perform much better overall than either a base GT-R (virtually no difference in any measure) or a C8 (which is nearly 1/3 the price).
People blame the NSX's slow sales on its price but I don't think that's the problem. NSX is a glorious name, Honda is a top tier engineering company, and they should be able to create and sell a supercar as well as any other brand, especially
Nissan, but they utterly failed despite being in a price bracket that sells reliably - the Huracan sold over 2,000 units in the US in 2019. Nissan took the turbocharged AWD giant-killer formula and applied it to the R35 undistilled, Chevy took the V8 out the front of a Corvette and put it in the back of a Corvette, Dodge put a stonkin motor and some new headlights on the Viper every few years, Lamborghini made a Lamborghini, Ferrari made a Ferrari, Porsche made a Porsche, etc. Honda did not make an NSX, they made some weird robot thing that nobody asked for and nobody wanted. That's why its a failure, and that's too bad because its actually a good car that nobody wants. People didn't want a "good car", there are already plenty of those. They wanted an NSX.
Edit: The most NSX-like car to hit the market since the old NSX was the Ford GT and it sold so well at an astronomical price that they had to extend its production.
