It's the colour range, they were just white led's with some adjustment, these bulbs take in a much wider colour range from a cold fluorescent white through to warm yellow/white soft glows.
These bulbs are more than adequate as 'main lights', of the few remaining traditional white cheap bulbs in the house I doubt any have been turned on so far this year - we only use the Hue bulbs now. Of course one solitary bulb 10' up in a 30' x 15' living room may not suffice, but if that's all you have swap the fitting for something that can take several bulbs and use Hue bulbs, it will make such a difference to the room.
Fair enough, I can see that wouldn't work for you. It's not expensive to change fitting though, and most of the lights in my house are lamps, the 'main lights' don't get used that often, certainly not in bedrooms or the main living room anyway.
Lamps are a good solution for people with partners who don't like the technology, as you keep the main light on the normal switch, the lamps that you would generally turn on one by one round the room can change to something more interesting.