I mean, the gameplay is mostly flipping through menus so I don't think saying it was better in every way is exactly true. They basically made it easier to bring up an attack that an enemy was weak against just by tapping R1, and they gave you a dash button. Like I said, minor tweaks that make the game slightly more user friendly. And there was plenty of jank with the stealth mechanics. I lost count of how many times I would flick the stick to shift around the corner when I was in cover only to jump out of cover and get ambushed from behind.
As far as characters and social links go, that's all a matter of opinion. I think Kanji's SL was the best I've seen in the series and I just think most of the others in P4 were better than most of the ones in P5. P5 had some really good ones like Kawakami and Futaba, but the rest felt sub-par to me.
We do agree that 4's soundtrack was much better though.