Demon Souls was harder. Dark Souls introduced Iron Flesh.
The answer to "Where did the fun go?" is it went exactly where the new Director wanted it to go. Gambling. That's right, the real fun now is for the gambling addicts to throw thousands of dollars down in an extremely low attempt to hit +20 on X weapon. If you want to support the brains behind this update, then start throwing all your cash at runes and blow everything to hell. Then after you give them 50% of your savings account, you can look forward to the next update of +25 enhancement.
If you don't like this update though, then stop spending money on this game and hope to God that no whales take the +20 bait. The only way this Director is getting fired is when the profit charts go negative.