2D sprite based games are timeless.

Seriously, look at Early 2D games. Sure, games like Pitfall, Pong, and most of the Atari 2600 era games are SEVERELY impaired in Graphics, compared to say SFIII Third Strike. But despute their graphical limitations  they have some charm to their aesthetics. If you compare that to Early 3D Polygonal games, like say Early era PS1 and Saturn games, it's not the same. When you're used to games with modern graphics and gameplay, it's VERY hard to go back to these "primitive games". Like say replaying the Original Tekken after Playing Tekken 7... For a bigger shock, go with SEGA's Virtua Fighter. They look and feel clunky with awkward controls, outdated graphics. And this goes all the way to PS3 era games. But put on Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo and the game won't feel as outdated as say Street Fighter EX +Alpha.

But this is not limited to games. Take mobies for example: 17 years ago, Tobey-Man was an amazing movie. Watch it nowadays and the CG Imagery looks incredibly dated and weird. But watch an episode of Batman: The Animated series and it's going to look as good as it did in 1994.

And now we get to the sad part... 3D Models are easier to work with than sprite art.
With 3D characters, you build the frame, build and add the skin and boom! You have a character. Then all you have to do is work on the animations and hitboxes. Alternate skins can be made available as DLC.

Not so much with Sprite based characters. You drew the first sprite... good now you have 1000+ more to go.
Alternate Costume? Redraw those 1000+ sprites all over again. This is why the beautiful sprite based games are a thing of the past... for the big companies...