There are different genres and developers in AAA space, the AAA space is not homogeneous by any means

I think you’re painting with an overly large brush, but I agree with the broad strokes. A lot of big “AAA” publishers that were firing on all cylinders in the 6th and 7th gens — Ubisoft, Activision, EA, Bethesda, 2K, etc. — are mostly skippable now. Microsoft- and Sony-published games are less essential today than they were a generation ago, with prominent exceptions like Astro Bot. Rockstar Games remains a big deal, but it turns out software so infrequently.

When it comes to “AAA” games, I primarily trust Nintendo and Capcom to deliver the goods, in terms of both quality and quantity. Outside of those giants, I mostly look to indie studios and Japanese “AA” games for greatness in the modern era.

Bethesda was already mediocre even in 7th gen, truth be told Bethesda releasing games for consoles have done irreparable damage to the quality of their RPGs,  with the last good Fallout (New Vegas) not even being developed by Bethesda itself lol 

EA... do they even have a single good game in any generation? I'm really asking because I can't think of any. I'm asking genuinely because I only remember them as developer of sports games 

As for Ubisoft, I think their early 7th gen games were important because it was an era we were still figuring out how to properly develop HD games with a large scope and scale, but from a purely gameplay perspective I've always found their games to not be that good tbh 

As for Activision they fully embraced the role of being a publisher rather than a developer. Blizzard still releasing/maintaining very good games, but they are mostly focused on live services which single player gamers hate I guess, but they are still competent in this specific market I'd say 

I agree with so much that is being said in this thread.  Another way to say it is 

Reasons why I love retro gaming:

1) Put in the game and immediately start playing, especially for the NES, Genesis and SNES.  Modern games have install times and lots of load screens.
2) 2D games especially have tight controls, twitchy gameplay, and lots of on screen interactions per minute.  Modern games are the opposite.

3) More freedom.  Less handholding and tutorials.
4) Tons of variety and experimentation in game types.  Games used to have more variety because budgets were smaller and studios took more risks.

5) Generally cheaper.  There are tons of old games that are fun but not too expensive (although there are a few that are very pricey.)  GoG.com has a crapload of great PC games that cost almost nothing.
6) Lots of shorter games.  You don't have to make this game your second job in order to complete it.

7) Highly curated.  There are a ton of places you can go to find what many people consider to be the greatest games of all time.  This is especially good if you know a reviewer or site that has tastes similar to yours.  Once you find that look for the games you haven't played yet and give them a try.  This tends to be a more reliable way to find fun games than listening to the modern marketing push.

I couldn't care less if a game is "AAA" or any other labels people want to apply. I don't even know what that means. Where is the line drawn? Expedition 33 is definitely closer to AAA than it is to an indie game made in someone's basement.

I evaluate each game for itself and have no intention of missing out on something good because I'm worrying about what kind of budget it has.

Dead Space

I think its about how much a game cost that makes it AAA(Meaning a huge amount of money)

But i could be wrong.

TloU 2 is just too fantastic a game for me to agree.

But I like all forms game budgets. Spend my money on AAA. Use PS Plus for everything else. So to speak.

It depends. The four games I've enjoyed the most over the past ten years were the two 3-D Zeldas, Cyberpunk 2077, and No Man's Sky. When I'm online, I'm almost always playing Mario Kart World (and MK8 before that), Virtua Fighter 5 REVO, or Street Fighter 6. I am looking forward to picking up my copy of the RE Generation Pack this week. I mostly stick to Sega, Square Enix, Capcom, and Namco for most of my contemporary gaming.

Indies have some cool concepts. I enjoy Ball x Pit a lot. But when I want to play games like that, I will generally gravitate towards Arcade Archives releases and Atari 50 over modern indies.

I'm sorry for you, I love them the same as before.