In most formats, losing life can be detrimental, but in Commander it is much more easily worked around, making the drawbacks of both cards not bad
This was one of those cards that a lot of decks were on the edge of playing, either because they couldn't quite get threshold reliably or they didn't want to splash one of the colors, inviting them to play a high-risk but high-reward game with their mana bases that both cost them games and won them games they had little right to win
Put a power and toughness sticker on it
Still, its a flexible construct that provides value when it dies, and you can even pump it if youre not doing anything else
As mentioned, cEDH decks are specifically built around the cEDH metagame
It's pretty awesome to make a Leviathan or Kraken out of nowhere on someone's end step, but it's even more amazing when you turn your Cryptoplasm into a second one on your upkeep