Interesting topic. In the GC/PS2 era I loved playing games. So many great games, I think as gamers we were really spoiled in that time period, hence my big PS2 backlog!
During that time I got really into retro gaming, bought a SNES, a Saturn and a Dreamcast. Man those were some great times. So many new experiences.
Playing Super Mario All Stars and World with a big grin on my face. Importing Chrono Trigger and Earthbound from the US and be amazed again. Playing Soul Calibur and Shenmue I and II on the DC, pure heaven.
But then the Wii/PS3 era arrived and I really felt disappointed. Yes there were some good games, but nothing wowed me big time. Motion gaming wasn't doing it for me and most of big blockblusters were bad to okayish to me (Portal 2, Final Fantasy XIII, Uncharted, GTA IV, Bioshock Infinite). I felt disconnected with the industry itself. So many gamers are enjoying these new games and I fucking hate them.
I didn't play for a year, but then one day I replayed Super Mario Bros. 3 and I finally finished it (for a first time) and that was a turning point and It felt like a geniunely liked playing a game again. After that I dug in my massive backlog and played some old JRPG's I have been neglecting for ages. Althought those games are pretty time-consuming and only a teenager can handle that, haha.
Nowadays I'm really picky about games and I only play games I really like. Sometimes I still make mistakes and buy a bad game and I try to play it to the end and see what the big fuzz is all about :-k. This happened to me three weeks ago with The Last of Us. I thought this game was extremely bad and people are talking about that it defined the Ps3. Aah that's why I probably did'nt like that generation, ha!
I have to say that Sony's E3 conference was pretty amazing and I got really thrilled about gaming again. Now I hope Team Ico, Square-Enix and Yu Suzuki can deliver some great games on the PS4. I missed them on the PS3.
There are times I just don't like to play games and then I don't play for weeks and then suddenly I see this awesome game in my backlog that deserves attention.