I continue to be very impressed with the advances in kit quality lately do to new technology, at least for major manufacturers. This is only for their newer kits, but is still very welcome. In the past year I have built a couple of newer Revell kits that are wonderful. I recently also bought the new, big London Bus kit and it is really amazing. I have it on the bench now. The sprue attachment points to each piece are very small, so not much cleanup left after snipping them loose. The relief angles are miniscule, so cleanup of assemblies with joining faces is less work than it used to be. There are even miniscule ledges inside the joints that almost lock the parts together. This closes the seams so tightly that very little putty/filler will be needed.
I had bought a couple of the newer Airfix a few months ago, and they have looked good in the box but I haven't got them on the bench yet.
And while some of the Asian kits are showing big jumps in price, at least Revell and Airfix kits, even newest releases, are real bargains in terms of what you get for the price. Considering the wide range of aftermarket available, with these new kits I think we are entering a new golden age of scale modeling!