Back in your supposed golden age of the early 2000s the cars were purely aero-limited, there were only a handful of overtaking moves for the lead during the entire season, and Schumacher would simply lead a procession to the finish in almost every race.

People moaned and moaned and said things were so much better in the days of active suspension, traction control, automatic transmission, and launch control. (But, of course, when those things were current people said life was better in the good old days with ground effect and massive turbos...)

Everyone always hates the current regulations, no matter what they happen to contain. But if you were to run a truly open formula the cars would be way too fast for any conceivable track and you'd see a casualty rate that would make the Isle of Man TT races look like a children's birthday party.