I disagree wholeheartedly. I think it's entirely that spit shine polish that the developers poured countless hours into doing, things that they absolutely did not have to do, that makes it much better.
Also, just about every character was "adjusted", but more importantly, many even have different skills now and play completely different than they did in either of the past two games. One of the major focuses on character development was improving "clone" characters, such as Luigi from Melee. Luigi now plays as an entirely different character with different moves now. And to differ it even more, Mario actually has a new weapon as well, pulling from Sunshine. However, every single character has had at least a minor change to their play style. Be it attacks reacting differently, doing different damage, or entirely different movesets, they all have changed.
Melee had fast combat. SSB had slow combat (for numerous reasons). Brawl took the middle ground, bringing the pace back to levels that are easier to grasp for lower-tier players, but still leaving much of what the higher-tier players desired from it. Yes, they implemented every conceivable control scheme, but you use that as a reason to attack Brawl, instead of commend them. We still live in a world where many game developers won't even let you change your keys!
And then on top of that, they added so much additional content it was staggering. They could have simply taken Melee, added a few characters and trophies, and called it a day. But they didn't. They didn't do it because they were afraid it wouldn't sell well. That's ridiculous. It was almost guaranteed to sell like hotcakes. No, they did everything they could to make their game more fun, new features, and resolve complaints. Frankly, I believe that it is hard to find a game that has more heart and soul put into it than Brawl in this day and age.
If you simply don't like the game, or you find it boring, that's one thing. But I think your accusations of it being "soulless" are unfounded and sad.