I don’t think I’m alone in this, but what I’m really wondering is if this is a result of getting older? Or is it because the gaming space itself has changed?
Both. When you’re older you don’t have as much time to play video games so you want that time to be more meaningful and for the games you play to be more concise. In addition, a lot of games have added “hundreds” of hours of content by large and relatively empty open worlds that are full of worthless autogenerated side quests and collectible trinkets, which is undoubtedly a worse gameplay experience.