I think he was better in 16/17 and even moreso in that spell in 15/16 where he was playing incredibly. Those 2 months in 15/16 he was at an amazing level in scoring, dribbling, and playmaking. 16/17 was mostly dribbling and playmaking, horrible finishing. Nowadays he is so wasteful with the ball and loiters around in midfield with pointless dribbles all the time. I am adamant that he has regressed.
That was a complaint about him at Barca but he's taken it to a whole new level since going to PSG. In this WC the amount of turnovers he had put so many other players to shame, statistically the SINGLE worst player at retaining possession on the ball in the entire tournament. Wasteful passes, wasteful dribbles, drawing fouls when it's completely unnecessary and disrupting the offensive rhythm of the team.
He was genuinely a burden on Brazil at times and aside from 2-3 nice actions he was one of the worst players in their loss against Belgium too and constantly fucked up in the final third for them. He also lead the Champions League 17/18 in turnovers per game as well.
He plays in a way that isn't conducive to success, mainly playing for himself and his stats/highlight reel. The ball HAS to go through him, he'll even drop next to the CB's to force that to happen and start dribbling in useless zones.
He is certainly not the 2nd best playmaker in the world after Messi, not even close. I would rather have De Bruyne, Coutinho, Modric, or even James delivering the final ball than Neymar, perhaps even more players. Efficiency in your playmaking matters and Neymar is atrocious in that regard. All you guys see is the occasional successful through ball that looks like a signature Messi pass and think it's the same, but it takes him like 3-4x the attempts to get one right and fucks up way more than is worth it, which those other playmakers don't make a habit of. And if he can't stop dribbling in such a counterproductive way then he isn't a top 2-3 dribbler anymore either. Hazard looks more efficient and Mbappe more deadly-to the point.