Would it be so hard to edit the Game and take the apostrophe out of each item that has one?
Depending on how the game is coded, that could actually be a much harder request than you think. You would have to find each piece of code that refers to any and every single item that uses an apostrophe and change the name. Automating the process is problematic, because you risk stripping apostrophes by mistake from things where you want to leave them (and that result could be ugly). And frankly, there could be LOTS and lots and lots of stupid, hidden pieces of code that break when you go to make a little change like this. It takes a longer time to change names, recheck, and then playtest for problems than you'd think. Hell, it takes longer to write 10 lines of working code and check it a few times than you'd think.
Also, it doesn't really change the fundamental problem of apostrophes interfering with, well, SOMETHING being handled incorrectly. And the truth of the matter is that THAT is probably causing problems other than just disappearing items. I know we see apostrophes switched to quotation marks in PM replies. I'm sure there are other strange things going on in how apostrophes are handled. So it's really a much bigger, badder underlying issue that is probably a monster coding problem to solve.
I imagine fixing THAT withing effing up absolutely everything is going to be a joy.
That is probably what is taking so long. The code all works together, or it should. Certain superficial changes aren't that hard, but you'd be amazed how easy it can be to really screw things up by changing what you wouldn't think would be a big deal.
Hopefully that helps explain from the other side why it might take a long time to see what seems like a small change. It may not make it any less frustrating, but it may make it more understandable.
Disclaimer: I have no knowledge of how DoE is coded or works. I just know that coding is a witch, and changing one or two "small" things can bring an entire game down. One little typo and before you know it, a frog spawns repeatedly and without end and the game crashes from server overload.