I've been feeling this as well. I'm not too into the Pis but I have one on my shelf for a "one day" project. Looking at the pi5 it's way too expensive I feel like it's lost its true niche and sold out being "too mainstream"

I need to look further into single chip computer things cause I've seen some competitors come out on my feeds. Hoping there's an affordable alternative to the Pi5 that beings back the Pi3 feeling.