Oh please. The storyline before Iga took over may not have been that "deep" but it was traditional. Dracula rose from the grave every hundred years and only the Belmonts were able to defeat him using the Vampire Killer. That's what made them so special. However, now anybody can defeat him, using any type weapon they want. And to make matters worse, he got rid of the Belmonts! Also, somehow, instead of returning from the dead every hundred years, Dracula is resurrected prematurely in almost every game.
Well he's kinda got a loop hole, since no game has every officially stated that the Belmonts and ONLY the Belmonts are able to defeat Dracula. The have the weapon and more than enough reason but obviously (even before IGA if you count Castlevania 64 and COTM) aren't the only people that can do it. They may be the only people that can completely destory him, but not defeat him.
You make it sound like half of the series is composed of other people defeating him when it's only been like what? Maybe three? Alucard, Hector, Maria (she helped so I suppose she counts...). And who else that's canon wise? All of which were proven to be exceptionally powerful enough to do such, though Dracula wasn't even at full power/strength in two cases and Maria only technically helped Ritcher. The Morris family is still related to the Belmonts and Soma never fought Dracula.
I actually understand what your saying about this possibly take away from the Belmont family being special but I also notice that:
1. As stated, there haven't been that many cases of someone else having to defeat Dracula and
2. It's only under a special circumstance, being that the Belmont family isn't there to help humanity, for whatever reason.
And how do you not see that he treats Richter like crap? He has him get brainwashed by Shaft, use his most powerful attack on Alucard for it to do hardly any damage, insinuates that Jonathon Morris could defeat him in battle, and has him lose the power to control the Vampire Killer.
A N T R A X X pretty much hint the nail on this one. He may have been brainwashed but it's not like it happened immediately. It appears that whatever Shaft did, it must have not only been quite powerful but it took a while to actually work on Ritcher. (Years it seems) I don't think it was meant to show how "OMFG!" weak Ritcher is, but how strong someone like Shaft is.
As for the attack on Alucard, I wonder if where the Belmonts acquire their power might have anything to do with this as a whole. Remember in PoR, Johnathan couldn't use the whip on Loretta at all and it ended up being because she wasn't 'completely' a vampire and still (I suppose) had humanity left. Alucard himself is half-human and has no ill intent, despite Dracula's bloodline. What if the whip reacts to this as a whole? As for his powers (like his crashes), what if they possibly work the same way? Or what if the fact that Shaft was controlling him (and thus, evil was) weakened their affects?
And he fought Ritcher's memory, not the actual Ritcher. And the game even went through the trouble of making it seem like he had a hard time doing it after the fact. I can't imagine him beating the crap out of the actual Ritcher.
And if that's not enough, he had Trevor get stabbed, doesn't even inform us on what happened to him, and turned Dracula into a Japanese teenager named Soma. He's a schmuck and his storytelling sucks.
I'll admit, I was pissed (Trevor is my favorite Belmont) when he never explained what happened to him, though I suppose whats her face explaining that he was wounded gravely but still alive, was suppose to be hint enough since it never states he actually dies. I kinda just figured Trevor getting hurt was the ONLY way Hector was going to be able to face Dracula alone cause yeah, Trevor could have handled his business.
Same as A N T R A X X here: don't mind that he's been officially reincarnated.