What the crap is this? The early games were there for the challenge, and they still are. Sure, starting out in the middle of nowhere with the only option to go left can be a quick summarize of the first Super Mario, and flattening moombas and frying flowers to their pixelated doom can be rather easy. The challenge is however is to keep it that way during the whole gameplay, and that is a very hard to do, at least for me. Scratch that talk about being not challenging, I like telling that fat plumber what to do in order for him to get his princess and earn some coins along the way. And FF1 is one of the most disturbing games in the world, but we love it because of that. The challenge, to be able to beat oldschool games and feel the nice feeling of nostalgia is what makes these games fun, not because of the plot or the character development.
However, if the games of today is bad or good, now that's an entirely different question.