True true - I was being flippant. My bad.

I can totally see why that's reason enough for you to play, but for me there couldn't be a bigger turn-off in a game. Never have I encountered a reward, item or leveling system that has interested me. It's all Reddit karma to me: meaningless digital points & pixels. They might look nice or play slightly better but they leave me completely cold.

There's only three reasons for me to play games, no less and no more: social experiences, novelties or creative expressions. I have a lot of hours clocked in TF2, Gmod and play Rocket League and Overwatch regularly because my friends play it and gaming with voicechat is often as fun as hanging out together. There's games that offer a touching or thought-provoking experiences, and if I like them I really love them. Games like Portal 2, Journey, To The Moon and The Beginner's Guide come to mind. Something that leaves a lasting impression.

The games that leaves all of them in the dust if I would've logged the hours are SimCity 3000, Rollercoaster Tycoon and Minecraft. I had not much resembling a social life back then so as soon as I got home from elementary school, I'd fire up SC or RCT and create the perfect city or theme park for hours on end. Minecraft came later and scratched not just my creative citybuilding itch but also the social one because I found a very nice online community.

As soon as I went to college that stopped dead in its tracks because I made a lot of new friends and found some cool creative outlets. Sometimes I fire up Cities: Skylines when I have a cool design idea. Ten-year-old me would have probably never stopped playing that - but I'm not ten anymore, so I do.