The old forums were susceptible to invasive doxing and whatnot. It was too easy to compromise the security so badspot bit the bullet and upgraded. As for the layout, it's just the design of the new system.
Also the forums are in a bit of a fickle mess. Most of the users who used to frequent the forums AND the game now just frequent the game. A lot of good people have left the forums for good. We're seeing a decline of players, a decline of posts, a decline of quality topics. Conan, Filipe, Swollow and a few others are like the only content creators left.
Forum mainstays like Heedicalking and Bushido, Rykuta, Gravity Cat, Gear, and Damien are gone.
Based on a little bit of my brown townysis the forums are on borrowed time. It's a really bad time for you to come back because now you're just witnessing the fall of the forums. But the game still has a couple of good servers floating around week to week. It's just harder to spark content on the forum due to the lack of users, and the presence of habitual users.