> without even the cushion of C (a.k.a. assembly with for loops)<p>This over-simplification is getting tiring. What's a typedef struct in assembly again? Or an union?<p>Like it or not, C _is_ a high level language.
These days, with tools like IDA and Ghidra, I find I’m no longer dealing with disassembly regularly. These tools are doing such a good job of turning assembly code into usable C that reading disassembly is now only necessary in corner cases (SSE functions, rare instructions like AAD, or obfuscated code). It’s honestly incredible how much progress has been made in this area over the past few years.