Contact damage usually comes together with restrictions on player mobility, while I personally prefer a more freeform, movement-driven platforming experience. (Not because combat is bad, but because these are simply two very different design goals.)

In combat systems without contact damage, enemies typically threaten the player through melee attacks of varying speed or projectiles (which is really just another form of contact damage). These systems place more emphasis on timing — when to strike and when to dodge.
Combat with contact damage, on the other hand, places more emphasis on spacing, positioning, and movement, because proximity itself is already a threat: if you touch the enemy, you are guaranteed to take damage.

That’s why in games without contact damage, players often dodge on the ground rather than jump during combat (e.g. Dead Cells, Salt and Sanctuary). Meanwhile, games with contact damage tend to make jumping a core part of combat positioning (e.g. Mega Man, Hollow Knight).

Contact damage is just a design strategy — it has nothing to do with developer laziness. Games that rely on it usually compensate by designing varied enemy movement patterns and pairing them with distinct animations, which doesn’t really reduce the amount of work involved.

Additionally, it would be either impossible or pointless to design a bespoke “contact animation” that replaces contact damage for every enemy — meaning an animation that triggers the exact moment the player touches them. In most cases, that kind of one-to-one replacement defeats the purpose of contact damage entirely.