I'm trying to get my kids to play Human Resource Machine. I hate the name but the game is okay. Because it's basically drag and drop assembly language the amount of steps for the challenges quickly rises. That's a bit of a shame, but the upside is it does sort of teach how a primitive computer would work at a low level for a kid who was grabbed by it.

The blog author and a commenter make a good point about how back in the day getting the computer to do just about anything was thrilling, whereas now expectations are a lot higher but so is the knowledge and effort required to make that happen.

Switching on a computer and getting nothing but a ready prompt somehow made it easier (or more necessary?) to make your own fun.