I could not agree more. When I upgraded my W8 to W8.1 and was greeted with the multi-coloured icon tiles, my first reaction was one of concern. Has something gone wrong in the upgrade? Do red tiles indicate incompatible applications? It had actually made me quite worried for a while until I realized that MS had just gone from a bad UI do downright ugly.

Regarding inverting transparency, I am sure I have seen it somewhere.