As someone who grew up in the Golden Age of video games, this makes me sad. You are no longer the player and the thing in your hand is not the game. The player is the company the game is you.

Maybe it was always like so, and I was young and having too much fun to realize. It really does seem like the idea of painting rich immersive worlds with challenging skills to learn and master has been tossed aside, in favor of simplified Skinner boxes with the minimum required skinning of a game and pay to play. Even more sad is how successful these "games" are. A reflection of the times I suppose - no time for dawdling about reading story or exploring worlds, quick information and quick rewards please, because time is too important to waste.