As Drupal 8 entered its last months of life, I found myself reflecting. What did version 8 mean for the project? What was lost? What was gained? What were the roads not taken? To try to puzzle out at least some preliminary answers, I read up on what others had shared and spent some time with various sources--Drupal core and contrib code bases, usage statistics, old conference presentations, release announcements and more. I started the exercise motivated by personal interest but now that I've wrapped it up I figure I may as well share my observations in case they're of interest to others.