This remains a hotly contested topic. Not the overall interface, because that seems to be well-liked. Rather, "Was the blades UI fast?" Some say yes. Others complain about the guide taking longer than 10 seconds to appear while in-game. It could be that there's a lot of conflicting opinion between those who view it through nostalgia and those who remember their experiences when it was the de facto UI. Sure NXE had areas where execution speed certainly wasn't fast, but in terms of perception I'd argue there could be something said about the UI elements being more spaced out and feeling "further away" with the paradigm they went with.

Oh, and the blades definitely had ads. Maybe not as many as future interfaces, but I'm not sure why people say it didn't.