There's really nothing boring about this Ryo... if anything, I'd say his old forms with more moves were more boring. How could this be so, you ask?
Most of the people I fought in the past always relied JUST on those moves. The leaping chop, The autoguard dash punch thing... They rarely ever seemed to actually use the protective properties of his Kohoken right, and of course, they could DP. Or they spammed Air fireballs like he was some reject Akuma. It never really felt that right for KoF, relying on obtuse keep-away and move priority, rather than actually learning the full character. I think it kinda held Ryo back.
The XIII Ryo, however, is a nice twist on the classic "Shoto" archetype. He has all the KoF-fitting reasons to get in and do some real attacks, and while he has elements of the traditional "control space, with Horizontal projectiles, and vertial DPs" game going on, his style of moves force him to get in much closer, more in-your-face, and his Autoguard attacks (his Parries) take more skill to use. I get the feeling that everything he does has weight behind it, and I rather like how his very serious-in-battle stance and moves now balance VS the other Kyokugen (Robert's more Sly, Yuri is goofier, and Takuma is the master, with the move cache to prove it).
While I can see why people who know the AoF team through KoF are a little annoyed with these new versions of the characters, I have to say, as one who liked them more from the AoF games, I like XIII's versions a lot. Robert used to be a favorite of mine, but all the odd changes he got over the KoF years made him such a mess... I like change in my characters, but some of the stuff just seemed un-needed and lacking in focus. Why did he get a flash kick, while having had a dragonpunch too? Changing from charge-motion fireballs to command motions, from power spheres to disk waves... and what the heck with a charge motion command-unblockable "throw"?
TL;DR - The previous KoF AoF styles were getting kinda messy. I'm glad to see them re-focused now. I think it actually, in an odd way, makes them more interesting!