Willie the Duck
Hero
Couldn't disagree with the OP more. I despised the "magic item shopping," "Christmas Tree effect," and "golf bag" of magic items that reached its zenith in 3.x. The game has moved steadily towards make such powers and 'magic' a part of character class abilities and growth.
I mean, compare it to, say, BX, and it is. All those little modular paragraphs describing what you can and can't do that used to be mostly in the spell and magic item section are now in the spells, magic item, class features, and feats sections -- the last two governed by character building, and the first codified as players getting to choose their spells known (rather than all or mostly finding scrolls and spellbooks in dungeons).Man, I'd love if 5e was that game.
Whether that's the case 3e-->5e, I don't know. probably in large part it is a matter of perspective. You don't need* a certain amount of magic loot to compete at any given level, but I guess the same can be said of 3e... you just take on CR X encounters at level Z instead of the level Y you otherwise would if you had all the magic bells and whistles ECL and NPC loadout suggested was normal.
*with some interesting choices, perhaps, if you can't get a magic weapon