Pixel Art was absolute high tech in its heyday. For the entirety of its relevancy, it was an engine of progress, and games drove the hardware to its breaking points. Actually, the lengths people went to edge out just a little more, the systemic complication this caused, was quite ridiculous and awkward, barely manageable and error prone. I was visiting some Retro Conventions, and they exhibited games on all original hardware, and I've got to say, it was not all so pleasant to look at, as we sometimes believe today from emulators and resource extraction. The slowdowns, flickering and other hiccups that were sometimes taken as acceptable trade offs for gaining a feature advantage over competition, were glaring now more than ever.
Now you might think that's all different today, we learned to appreciate pixel art in a different way now. But I'd not be so sure about that. Actually, when you look at the market today, a pixel art arms race has once again begun for upping the ante, with people making great efforts in their development, pushing not hardware but middleware, to make their pixel art stand out. If you were to look at their project sources, you'd notice it ain't that pretty as you'd hope, often much more complicated actually than doing straight 3d nowadays. And even in communities for pixel artists, you see them often push it with unimaginable amounts of effort put into high fidelity images. That graphics arms race never stopped. No matter the subject, some people will interpret design as to do more with less, others will interpret it as to do more than was thought possible.
However, in the past, no matter the push, the restrictions were still so harsh, that the art styles developed to make pixel art work were necessary in a way that they were not after. It is even so, that the wave of realism that came with 3d was a conscient decision to break away from the aesthetics of pixel art. 3d was meant to be a revolution, and even the graphics design was meant to communicate that. But it is pretty much only today that realism actually works. And those 3d titles that held themselves closer to the design principles that were developed first for pixel art, aged best.
Hell, in a lot of ways, today's Minecraft is actually a step back even from the original Doom! However what we also learn to appreciate is not only the visuals of pixel art, but its mechanic behaviour for how to create and play, and clearly Minecraft is in many more ways a huge step forward in that above the old Doom, or any other modern title for that matter. So what is at first surprising to think about, how can all these people today accept Minecraft's visuals, not only accept but even love? And the reason is, that its aesthetic makes perfect sense in light of the functionality.