Yeah, until .NET you could literally run almost any Visual Basic program written for any previous version; VB6 can open a VB2 project, for example (as long as the VB2 program is saved as text). Any project could be opened in the new IDE, and with a few minimal changed, run just fine.
VB .NET requires a complete rewrite for all but the most trivial applications to be ported from VB6. The language itself is good, and it answers a lot of requests for features put in for "VB7" but the whole thing where MS breaks 14 years or so of compatibility just doesn't sit right with a lot of people.