What this particular chain of thoughts shows is that adults don't read for pleasure either, they associate it with an uncomfortable hard thing one should to do "build character".
We've all learned the lesson that sometimes you have to struggle through something hard, to be able to access better pleasure.
You did not struggled and it was not hard. Kids books were written to be easy at age they were targetted at.
If the issue was just "hard" videogames woulsndo the job.
I might be missing some other reasons why this could be happening, like increases in game balance and coordination.
Play Mario Odyssey for an hour or two then play Super Mario Bros 1, 2, or 3 as one startling example.
One of the things though is when most peopley play SMB 1-3 today, they're playing with input lag. Mario Wonder was designed with input lag in mind, SMB 1 was not and it increases the difficulty.
Mario Wonder lets you choose to use invulnerable characters, etc. There was only one level I remember needing to try many times to beat. OTOH, there's lots of difficult levels in smb 1...
In the world of games outside the big money AAA MBA stuff, there's plenty of highly challenging franchises that maintain true to themselves and thrive, even with plenty of kids playing. E.g. - I suspect the median age for Binding of Isaac is well below the age of consent.
