I remember when the game files got hacked before release, and you could run around in half completed maps and small area snippets. I spent hours running around in awe of the new physics engine

I was just going to say the same thing. I couldn't afford the rigs needed to run any of these games and never really played them. Now, it's running inside a browser on a laptop.

Same here - splashed out crazy money upgrading my PC to play HL2.

After that moment I switched to consoles.

In a few years todays high end AI models will run on your watch

Of course that assumes we maintain open access to compute that we've enjoyed for the last half century, and I doubt that very much.

Stallman warned about the dangers of software being closed [0] 30 years ago, and the majority of modern IT industry just laugh a that sort of stuff because you can't make a billion dollar startup with that attitude, but I think the restrictions on owning the hardware at all will probably come first.

[0] https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.en.html