I’d like to think that 
Yes, they did. Although back then I didn’t use UE (nor Unity).
Making game never simple, even when using UE4 or Unity. Nowadays marketing is everything.
As for ideas being used up, I personally don’t like those weird “innovative” games that sweep one award after another. I only play certain types of games with certain settings / story lines. I don’t really care if at their core they are all the same. As long as there is atmosphere, decent characters, decent progression and fluid gameplay, I am in! So if you make another Dangerous Dave game with maybe a few new elements, I’ll buy it!
Since lack of textual scripting language is such a bother to a lot of people in this thread, why are you (or those people rather) still and using UE4 ? :rolleyes:
There are literally more important areas to improve. Scripting language is not an improvement in UE4. It’s a waste of development resources, something that could be directed to areas where improvements are needed.
There are many more artists / designers in game dev field than programmers. Those people create games (not minimizing role of programmers , but clean and reusable and performant code will not make a game to be a fun and entertaining game). Those people will use BP to make a prototype. If they have funds / luck they will get programmer to move slow parts to C++ if necessary. If not, they can optimize BP as much as they can and release the game.
Having textual scripting language will not help designers and artists to make better games. It will only slow them down.