There exist methods to visualize and monitor the risk of increasing complexitiymethods to visualize and monitor the risk of increasing complexitiy for (big) projects and code. When they are applied reasonably hopefully a new name for the point of no return is not needed. (There is a related MOOC at openHPI: https://open.hpi.de/courses/softwareanalytics2015/)
Structural Complexity Structural Complexity is a general design problem - not only for software design in big teams. Visualisation is the first step in structural complexity management. Matrices and directed graphs can also be used for this purpose.
The some methods to reduce structural complexity are http://www.buch.de/shop/home/suche/?fq=3540878890:
- modularisation
- avoidance of feedback loops
- triangulation
Furthermore there is the concept of axiomatic designaxiomatic design: https:\en.wikipedia.org\wiki\Axiomatic_design
With this concept reliabiltiy problems due to unneccesary complexity can be avoided.
Thus there are a bunch of methods available. In the end it is always about the decision to think about them because a project gets big enough.