The opposite side of that coin is a required up-front install of every package that might ever be needed for every possible scenario... in which case people would complain (even more) about massive installs.

The internet exists, the industry has evolved, software has dependencies, and yes you have to download them (just like you had to download the SDK ISOs back in the day). But it's just one command, run it and get it over with, and after that up-front one-time pain you'll have a nice offline workflow.