I'd suggest checking out "Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar" to learn about their design process. It's fascinating. There can absolutely be visionaries out there... Miyazaki, Kojima, Miyamoto are probably the top three right now. But there's a ton that are kinda went out with a whimper such as Molyneux, Wright, Carmack, Romero, the Housers, Schafer, Sweeney.

I think abstraction is key. There's gotta be a happy medium between absolute control or almost a sense of worship and not allowing a singular person to guide the ship.