There was a recent developer video from Sony with Yoshida where he himself described this game as for "very casual" players.

It's also been said that you can click off the buff like any other buff if you want to challenge it at normal difficulty.

Why do people even care? It's not as if it's going to invalidate your personal accomplishments. You beat it when it was relevant and in 2.2 you're going to beat the cutting edge content well before a good chunk of the population. I don't see the problem?