The Genesis 3 model is 34k Tris and 17K polygon at full resolution. 90% of that is in detailed areas like toes inner mouth. Decimating or lowering the resolution for say LOD’s is not an issue if you can pre-process using an app like 3ds Max but the character frame work is modular as to being able to hide sections of the body that you don’t need so easy to make heads with out bodies that you can add as a component to even lower resolution body models.
A lot of stuff you see is of poor quality because DS is the number one alpha character tool and has been downloaded millions of time and being on their e-mail list I receive at least twice a week a newsletter with specials and items of interest but implying that it’s a toy would be like implying that a tool like Unreal 4 is a toy based on the things people are willing to show off.
What is impressive about DS is the things you don’t see as to practical use in the world of visual media and just like speedtree you would not know that it was used in films like Avatar as well that a similar custom made product was used in Sprites with in as well alpha modeling used in the Lord of the Rings using Massive. Interesting note I’ve heard that Epic is working with Weta so I’m very interest to see what comes of that but a use of a given tool that can be used in Unreal 4 just because of strong FBX support should not be judged based on someone inability to swing a hammer properly.
As for licensing fees Daz3D has always been known as a habit of releasing products with a price tag to avoided the free collectors who all ways show up first in line and grab stuff with no plans of actually making use of it and then being stuck with the bandwidth bill with little or no benefit to them of people actually using their products so I would expect that once the dust settles, and since they are in the business of selling art assets, would or will eliminate the licensing “extension” and switch to “licensing in hand” just the same way things are run on Epic’s market place.
Come to think of it their marketing strategy seems to be following along with the same idea as to how Unreal 4 first started as a subscription based product that was discarded when there was enough serious people doing serious things.
Understandable though as our team has just switched to using the Genesis 3 frame work but took over two years of testing to come to the decision to actually make the switch.
As for the seedy things of things what can I say the Internet was made for porn. 
But if you want to see the serious side of yet another tool read the users stories of how they use a hammer called Daz Studio in the effort that it takes for them to get their job done.