There is no PVE content or dungeon require spending to progress even in the earlier days. I never spend money to buy legendary gems or boost my reso yet I am still here farming at the highest difficulty available as everyone else.
How about you just try yourself now considering that you don’t need to pay to re-install the game? If you still feel the same after playing DI after re-install it, you can always uninstalled it. It is not like it will cost you a penny to do it.
If you ask me, it is always better for you to evaluate yourself than listening to anyone, especially from content creators nowadays where they love to make clickbait video where they exaggerate the issue so big to just to get clicks and views.