I think we ought to separate whether we're talking about buffs or enemy-targeting spells in this conversation AND recognise that D&D has a bad history with buff spells - which you've experienced in PF (3E's successor).
(3E TT and 2E BG2, especially ToB, suffered from buffs badly. To briefly summarise, 3E TT required a spreadsheet by around 9th level and BG2-ToB a spells cast in order list. Basically, play became work, and power level between normal and buffed characters was enormous.)
I'm all for enemy-targeting spells to have individual targeting, regardless of level. There's real tactical choice here and it's not repetitive. I never cast Bane because it's random and unreliable, although I recognise it synergises with subsequent AoE spells.
For Aid, I like this buff because it doesn't need to be timed - it lasts all day. The extra HPs balances well with the cost of slot spent, and this works when you upcast too. That it affects a 4th character + familiars/companions is basically irrelevant; I'm still not putting Gale in the frontline and something more than a strong breeze will still wipe the familiar. If beastmaster rangers benefit a bit extra? Good for them, it's a niche case.
Making a clear distinction between buffs and debuffs/disables might actually allow the best of both worlds. That way buff spells can change in the fashion of Aid and Mage Armor. Those that come to mind right away are Motivational Speech and Heroes' Feast (if we even get to that level). Maybe Larian should just not implement those at all for aforementioned reasons, but that is a different topic.
On the other hand spells without damage dice attached to them can then still make an immediate impact in combat with full player agency by just choosing targets.
I am pretty sure it was the use of twinned that brought my attention to this issue in the first place. So as the wizard already outperforms the sorcerer in most ways, which is a general 5e issue, the way twinned metamagic is implemented worsens this imbalance quite a bit. Despite the difference in power, I still expect a lot of people will play sorcerer, and almost every one building to be effective in combat will learn twinned metamagic, unless they read beforehand how it is implemented. An option to toggle between AoE and targeting would satisfy me personally as I would even mod the game for this to change. But I am not sure a lot of players frustrated by the AoE restriction would go into gameplay options to find this, unless they got a specific hint or tutorial advice for it.
