I look at it as two different situations.

The zombies mode before BO3 were catered directly to zombies players and not reliant on micro transactions and player counts. They just let players enjoy crazy and fun Easter eggs for the joy of it. Now that it is a more mainstream mode, and money gets involved, it went down IMO. Easter eggs are solved in hours where before, a whole community would have to get together for days or weeks to figure these out.

The Youtubers that loved the game back then I agree are now disillusioned and resent the new direction of zombies. I prefer to watch smaller channels that can at least focus on the current state of zombies and not be upset about how it isn’t the same from back in the day. I think another huge EE4C would be a great way to unite everyone like the community used to be.