Game Design Is Hard

I have been trying to figure out what is in the mind of gamers for a long time.  I do this by simply playing video games and observing my own attitudes and feelings during the process.  I also read comments and blogs and watch videos of people playing games on yoob (shorthand for youtube).

I just can't figure it out.  It seems that the most popular games are ones that allow gamers to do what they want.  Like Gary's Mod, a physics sandbox game based entirely around the Half Life Engine.  But then there's games that don't allow any user input and are very successful like Dark Souls franchise.  There's hard games, easy games, ugly games, beautiful games; and all can be successful or catastrophic failures.   There is no reasoning behind any of it.

I feel totally lost in this approach to game design.  I find myself constantly alienated from all other gamers and want to be ostracized, forever.  There doesn't seem to be any end to this damnable oblivion of opinions and game types.  There seems to be a never ending cast of genre types and game play styles that merge and converge on each other.  MMO.  RPG.  MMORPG.  RTS, RTSMMORPG.  FPS.  FPSRTSMMORPG.  Then those acronyms lose all meaning when actually experiencing a game first hand.  Because each game is it's own unique experience.  Genres be cursed.

I've been down a dark well of thoughts that can't be quantified.  Just a murky sense of direction down a dark chamber of horrors that no one wants to contemplate.

Maybe Game Design is actually not about figuring out the minds of gamers, but figuring out my own mind.