In the middle of the current video game generation I've once decided to play a Zelda game for the Game Boy Color (Oracle of Seasons). The experience that I had was so great that it made me think how could I possibly have forgotten how fun videogames can be.
Now, that game has the most crude graphics as the pixels limitate the possibilities of artistic expression immensely (and in that way I agree limitation can be harmful), but perhaps that was exactly what made the journey so interesting. The more limited the graphics, the more I had to fill the information with my imagination. For instance, I have the memory of the first quest being sent to the beach and finding your sword. There you find a cave, some monsters you must evade, then find your sword and kill the enemies on the way back (released catharsis). Now, the game only has the ability to show you symbols of what things represent, such as sprites of trees representing florests, bushes that you know you can burn to open your way. It required from me the almost the same ammount of imagination as describing those things with words, so that's why it was, in the end, more engaging than most current jaw-dropping games. Also because they focused on the sweet gameplay.
As I said before, describing things with words require mindwork to create the imagery, and that's the reason why storybooks are still as appealing as ever as well. It's simply because, instead of being spoon-fed, some of us still prefer being engaged in the task of being part of the creation.
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