I, of course, cannot speak for others, but, the only thing that has ever worked for me was, what others considered, over simplistic. I knew that I wasn't going to be able to deny myself the foods that I really like. Life is short whether you're overweight or not. So I decided to just eat what I always ate but in smaller quantities and then I became more active. I played more golf (even with a cart) and walked every other day. Outside if it was nice or in the mall if it wasn't. Over three years I lost 80 pounds, 10 inches off my waist and even 4 inches off my neck.
I had a lot of excess to begin with and I am still not down to the place where I figure that continued success without some other additional effort may be difficult, but, I'm pretty happy for two things. The first is that I have lost a lot of weight and that I kept all my clothes that I had expanded out of and can wear them again. Now I have to make the move to get rid of my big fat clothes to make room for my not as fat clothes. Somewhere along the line I will need a whole new wardrobe.