It depends how serious you are about image quality.
I know when the G10 first came out serious photogrephers with top of the range DSLR's were blown away by the G10's image quality with some favourable comparisons made with even medium format cameras in terms of resolution and detail, and smoothness etc.
You can buy cheaper point and shoots sure, but they wont give you the same image quality.
So it depends how obsessive are you about image quality. Most cameras these days give acceptable results. I'm even quite impressed with my iPhone's camera.
But a camera like the G10/11/12 will allow you to blow a photo up and hang it on the wall, where the same image taken with a cheaper camera might show some flaws (which you may be unaware of but would be obvious to a pro).