That's fair. Personally, I'm young enough that I didn't play the likes of Deus Ex, Thief and System Shock 2 when they were new; like I noted in my summary of Human Revolution, it's pretty much that game alone to thank that I started branching out and got into some of these other ones. HR was a completely new world for me.
I'd be hard pressed to choose between the first Deus Ex and HR. Both are excellent. Mankind Divided was a disappointment, the story just didn't go anywhere and it's maybe too similar to HR in terms of everything else. Not to mention the idiotic micro-transactions.
Sure, when the budgets are high and there is the never-ending race to top the latest best-seller, it's a tough sell for AAA studios to innovate.
There's a reason for that: I don't really play AAA games. All the AAA games I played from the last decade are on the list, at least mentioned, save for Halo 4. As my list shows, I'm a huge fan of certain types of games (atmospheric puzzle, stealth, immersive sim, good stories), and AAA studios rarely deliver on that front.
You say that, but the last room in HR took me like three hours.
But I get what you mean. Certainly in the world of AAA, it's a bigger issue. I get a lot of thinking from all the puzzle games, lol.