Before gaming went "mainstream." Which I've been calling the Big Bang death cry as right as that show got popular it was "cool and trendy" to be a "nerd gamer." And games slowly began to spiral in quality not long after. Once we left the Xbox 360 games have been live service, minimum viable products. Where the vast majority of AAA just means the game isnt actually finished until at least a year later. IF its not a Live Service game. Anyone that actually likes games has been tired of the AAA shovel ware for years now. The only people that arent tend to be shills who whole YT channel or personality needs the slopy to be relavent.
All that to say this. The "sizable group of weirdos" never went anywhere. We've all just been drowned out by the mass influx of mindless slop goblins and the "modern Audience."
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Very true. Games went from a weird niche in the 80s to a pretty profitable golden age in the 90s and 2000s where juuust the right balance was struck between budget and profit-seeking and still having a small, passionate team that wanted to do something incredible. But by the mid 2010s devs and publishers just weren't competing to create the most fun or innovative products anymore: they were competing to create the most effective scams and life-style props. Games ceased being practical things to be ENJOYED and became a weird kind of status symbol of being in the cool "geek" crowd, a way to posture. Except that by the time this happened, the hobby had largely been murdered and these people were just wearing its skin.
This isn't to say all good games magically ceased in 2013 or something. They still happen. But they're much, MUCH rarer: an unqualified "amazing" game is nearly a unicorn now. And they're almost always from smaller teams largely outside the industry.
Also, excellent username.