Yup just imagine your 8 year old Q9550 is still going strong on the latest games. And i am very certain based on current projections it will last another 7 years again before it becomes minimum.
And we have not yet even begun to talk about the fact that 90% of gamers are playing games that still run on single threads. Games designed each with a 10 to 15 year life span.
CS 1.6 and Starcraft 1, 15 and 17 years old respectively are 2 of the most active online games currently.
And just imagine, back then we didn't have all these options of having future proof hardware like core i7 etc. Back then was old single core CPU. And was the golden age of PC hardware.
I don't believe for a second that an i7 will last 20 years, but I believe 100% what the OP is talking about in that an i7 will last the 90% of PC Gamers 20 years simply because Valve, Blizzard and Riot are easy to predict. Incase many missed it, 90% of PC Gamers play the same game everyday because of its monetary online capability, the ability to earn ingame currency that translates into real world currency.
when you have as much invested in a League of Legends account it further cements you into the same game. Its incredibly infinite variables involved in its gameplay also keeps it fresh this is why MOBA players never get bored of the same game even after more than 10 years.
No, while people are still playing them, they are mostly replace by SC2 and GO.
Most popular games like Lol, DoTA2, Minecraft, CS:GO, SC2, D3 etc are only about 3-5 years old, WOW is the only exception, might want to fact check before you post.