If you ever want to put it into perspective, check out the world record speed run for the game. I've seen guys breeze through games like Battletoads as if it were absolutely nothing. This YouTube channel does a great job chronicling the progression of world records for some of the biggest games... https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtUbO6rBht0daVIOGML3c8w/videos
One of the best metaphors I heard of for Super Mario Brothers is that's it's like a playground (back before the Karens made them all super safe). First you got the swings and the slide. Then when you get bigger and older you can play on the monkey bars and other equipment. SMB1 has depth in. You can play as a young child. When I first played, we considered it winning to just beat the Bowser lookalike in level 1. Bonus points if you can shoot him. Then winning was actually winning. Then winning for me became winning without warp zone. Then winning for me became finding all the secret stuff. I'm more of a completionist than a speed runner. In pretty much every game I ever play.
Krak les Chevalies (sp?)? Looks kind of like it, anyway. You know those books you get as a kid that let you build paper models of things? I had one for Krak les Chevalies, and it looked a lot like that... Okay, that one I know! That's either a salt-pan lake or full of a certain kind of algae!