It's all about presentation, I believe. It is really hard to find a way and present the oldies in a good enough light to make them seem worthwhile.
Any game with depth requires your dedication, that is a fact. OTOH, many old games are no longer playable, which is a rather sad result of our technological advance. If something requires too much dedication AND isn't presentable (like what happened to me when I was trying to play original Wasteland or Daggerfall), we have to really REALLY believe that it would be worth our time to be able to pull through. And it just isn't in cases I mentioned. Some games are too old, man. It's not worth going past a certain point because a truly complex game needs a complex system running it. It just wasn't possible to have before latest decades. I know, I started off with some prehistoric examples here, hang on a bit.
I quickly realized that I could never go further than Pool of Radiance and made peace with the past. And, as years went on, I can freely say that I WILL NEVER AGAIN REPLAY the first Icewind dale or Baldur's. There is nothing more that I can gain from them, plus both of these have a much smoother and improved sequel. The oldest and/or crappiest looking ones that I can still play - Arcanum for example - I will play them forever out of stubbornness despite it's hideous, horrendous execution. I LIKE Arcanum on a very personal level and that will go with me to my grave, but the game looks and feels awful. Some older oldfag has the same attitude towards OG Wasteland, I'm sure of it. So, the oldest of these pioneer works inevitably get outdated. Progress is something that must happen, things are destined to be improved upon. Despite this, games that never got their upgraded successors do exist. There is no improved Gothics or Fallouts. There is no D&D based cRPG that does D&D justice that it deserves. Some oldies are all we got.
Therefore, I came to the conclusion that getting someone to play them after their time requires - a marketing expertise. You need to literally marinate someone to the best of your capabilities to make them give these a go.
Wait. Was it ever any different? Have you forgotten how hard it was to get anyone hooked on some of these games even during their time? There was alot less options back in the day, that's probably the only reason we ourselves gave many games a shot, only later becoming aware of their real value.. I now consider games to be a superior medium over movies or books, because you get to actually participate in it. But I will admit it here - I myself had to be marinated in order to give some games a chance.
When it comes to latest generations of gamers, the only way you could even attempt to make some depth-craving youngster to play an old rpg is if you somehow manage to (legally) get them in a "Cabin in the Woods" type of situation, and all therein is would be and old PC with ONE game. That's one way I guess. Recreate the old TIMES. You can have the internet and whatnot, the PC that can run old games ONLY is the key. And maybe, just maybe, you can hold their attention long enough to make them see the actual forest within the ugly trees. Look. It's not even their fault, it's just that we're human as f. I think rpg lovers are born in every generation, but I don't delude myself that I would be any different than this youth if I was born in these times, bombarded with information and having a sea of entertainment at my disposal whenever I feel like it. TRASHING YOUNGER GENERATIONS IS NOT A WAY. Making an effort to APPEAL to them - might be. Show them reviews, LetsPlays, let them see you playing and enjoying it. Make them see it on your face when you recall your found memories with those games and be honest about how old and imperfect they are. A natural spontaneous marination, if you will.
We had a teenage player here at the Codex (Admiral Jimbob) play through Wasteland here about 10 or so years ago, full "Let's Play", and he not only finished it, but actually said he ended up enjoying it immensely, after laughing at the graphics initially.
You make a good point that old games aren't for everybody, especially those who are used to today's comforts. But you miss another salient point; Only a subset of the population were gamers back in the 80's (even the 90's really), and only a subset of that subset were CRPG players. So expecting the multitudes that play new CRPGs to be remotely interested in the really old stuff is expecting a bit much. Even if the same amount exist today that used to play CRPG's (Pool of Radiance was considered one of the greatest CRPG hits of all time when it reached over 100k copies sold back in the late 80's. It ended up being quite a bit more than that, but 100k copies sold in today's triple AAA market would be the failure of the century) you would hardly hear from them, as having say 50-150k young players enjoying 1980's stuff wouldn't be a blip on the gaming market radar.
I will concede also that a lot of people that were playing the C64 version of a game would be envious of those playing the Amiga or ST version of a game (even though said game was usually exactly the same in mechanics and execution, apart from a few that had more on the 16 bit machines, and the odd, rare 8 bit version that had more). They looked better, shinier, used an exotic mouse, looked more like the arcade version, blah blah. That is just how it was for a lot of people. I even see this attitude with oldfags on forums today; Many of them turn to the shiniest version of a 1980's/early 90's game whenever possible. They could play the Apple II or C64 version, but usually opt for the Amiga, ST or (insert Japanese PC) version because graphics, sounds, whatever.
I am an outlier in that I prefer playing the old games on a real C64, with real disks, with real disk drive sounds (but with jiffydos speed, I'm not entirely insane), real C64 sounds etc. Or games I played on Amiga on a real Amiga. Don't ask me why, that is just how it is. But I can understand people that want to make everything as comfy as possible and have as many bells and whistles as they can, as this amounts to most people.
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