That was true, 20 years ago. I've moved on though. I no longer want to have the same repetition of movements trying to beat the same thing over and over. It was great when that was all there was, and I had many hours in the day to spend doing it.
I think for me, the best analogy is with TV.
Games way back when were like watching a marathon of Tom and Jerry cartoons. Great gratification, fun, but essentially the same thing over and over. As a young person, you're happy to have this repetition, you really enjoy it.
As you get older though, you want a bit more depth. Okay, it doesn't mean it's any better, or any different, it's just dressed up differently - but instead of five minutes of "bash, crash, bang", you have half an hour of dull characters yelling at each other in a soap opera.
Gaming isn't just about gaming now, it's a media in its own right, although still very simple and in its infancy.
I used to role play, and for me, the gaming aspect was all about telling a story. The mechanics of playing the game always got in the way of the tale and the active part I played in it. I don't want games to be passive, but I want them to reward me in other ways than simply to say "I beat a hard bit". I want a twist in the tale, or to be blinded by an action piece in the way I would be in a movie, only in this case, I have some degree of control. This is something that started with the original point and click adventures 20+ years ago!!! We may now have guns and FPS controls to make our way from story element to story element - but we're still doing the same kind of thing, helping to tell a tale.
Though, I still like a gaming challenge. There are two sides to this. There's the media approach, and also the "sport" approach. A sportsman will practice their skills at a very specific ability over and over. "Classic" games are more like somebody who plays a sport. You practice and make it perfect.
Trying to lump all games into a single category just isn't possible. It's like asking somebody to play guitar while running, or throwing the discus while ready Trotsky. Some games are fun and entertaining, others have a purpose of telling a tale where you take the starring role. There's more than enough room for both sides.
