[jerf]

Your needs a few years ago, or your needs now? As benbenhu says, it has gotten a lot better. Lately I've found that when DDG doesn't have the thing I want and I stick the !g in, Google doesn't necessarily do any better, which implies that it's just a hard search.

[bleuarff]

I second that. I rarely use the !g bang (no need for that, DDG has the anwsers), but when I do I don't get anything more significant.