I think older graphics enforced artistry. It created limitations what force creativity in order to make something that feels good. Style matters, framing matters, directing matters.
You see the same thing with the quality of code itself too, limitations of older hardware forced incredible levels of creativity that programmers went to in order to squeeze the most out of the limitations they had.
I think also the limitation of older graphics created a diversity of solutions, which is why there's such a broad range of older styles even within each era. There's a hundred ways to try and solve a problem whereas if you don't have a problem then everything trends towards doing the same thing.