Interesting analysis and I think it is mostly spot on. Where I diverge is seeing this end of innovation phase as a bad thing. I think we all have gone a little crazy with the post-pandemic ease of entry and wave of funding, designing and producing tools all driven by late-stage capitalism culture of constant consumption. It has been fun but maybe now is a time to consolidate, reflect and just get games on the table, be they innovative or old classics. There is room for growth but many (even most?) leisure activities don’t evolve with constant innovation. Do people at the tennis club yearn for new rulesets (well bad example given the rise of pickleball). The games themselves should be sufficiently engaging to maintain a player base and fun for decades. I would argue that TTRPG’s have demonstrated this. One could even argue that the recent rise in new-OSR is partially a reaction to all the innovation. In my gaming corners of the world and internet, I wouldn’t say there is a ton of innovation but there certainly seems to be a lot of creative energy and community going on.

Anyhow not really disagreeing with you as this is basically what you are doing, just hoping to help you see it as not so negative.