That is a very good point. I have loved things about them being in Storybrooke, but it isn’t the thing that makes the show good. Especially now that it hasn’t felt peopled, in my opinion, for a very long time. Hopefully that will change since a new group of people have come to town. They still need to do a better job showing reoccurring background characters, like they did in Season 1. Granny, Ruby, Graham, the dwarfs, the doctor. Those reoccurring characters make the place feel peopled.
Also, the problem is and always has been that the characters don’t react properly to what is happening to them. They don’t act like real people. The problem is the characters are not developed properly and their actions don’t further the story. The problem is the writing, so that is what they need to fix. Them being in Storybrooke, won’t make the action and reaction between the characters choices feel real and earned and make sense. That just has to be written better and deeper and realer and i am not sure the writers will ever be able to do that.