@AterNox yeah, everyone's experiences are subjective, but I felt like there should be a different "tier" of gameplay if that makes sense. Like at some point, I feel I should need the best of the best pals to defeat bosses, but it doesn't really ever feel that's the case.
An "endgame" that's a tad different from the core gameplay loop similar to how Minecraft progresses on after getting diamonds. You don't necessarily need to do much mining after that, if you don't want, yet in beta, that's all there was.
I quit Minecraft back then for the same reasons and would feel similarly screwed over if they'd made it free to play when 1.0 dropped in 2012.