This is because a lot of older games were going for an artistic style>

BioShock is a perfect example because of its beautiful art direction. >

I totally agree with you. Another good example is Alice: Madness Returns. Just booted it up for the first time yesterday and it looks so good, pleasing in a way.

There are just so many good games out there. No time to play them all. Also i think epic free games and this prime free game stuff contributed to it. I just started playing bioshock bc of it. Also on pc it feels so good to play an old game and just crank up every setting to max, 4k, install some mods, no ai upscaling but msaa 8x and not having to worry about performance even on mid range PCs. I genuinely prefer the graphics of older games since for me image clarity is much more important than how many polygons a gun has or how the puddle of water reflects light. Like even the new unreal engine 5 games cannot run maxxed out on a 5090 in 4k without upscaling. They only look good in trailers.