I grew up with Atari and the NES. I think it’s actually both ways. I don’t think casual games were ever really a pushback against difficult games though, I think they were just trying to reach a wider audience. Take Subway Surfers for example, it’s probably the best example of the casual (phone) game. Anyone can pick up and play it, and if you fail, you just start over. IIRC you had to watch an ad first though? I dunno, I got hooked on it and I bought the coin doubler for $5 which also removed the mandatory ads (not the ones you can opt to watch to double some prizes or open ad-gated prize boxes though). That’s all I ever paid for it — far less than any paid game. Of course you can’t “win” at it either, it just goes on forever. On consoles, you also have Animal Crossing and the like. Games that never end but you can’t lose, either. Like you can get stung by wasps or scorpions or bit by tarantulas (though the latter two encounters are rare), but you just pass out and wake up in front of your house with nothing lost. But no, I don’t think casual (e.g. Animal Crossing) or accessible (e.g. Subway Surfers) was an active “push back” against the “NES Hard” trend of hard gaming.

Of course, arcade games weren’t just hard to be hard — like Subway Surfers and other phone games, they exist to get you to spend money. An arcade game that isn’t generating revenue isn’t desirable to people who operate arcades.