"Okay, I hit you, now you hit me."
Like watching two colonial era armies square off, taking their respective turns firing into hordes of defenseless soldiers in formation, a turn-based system in today's gaming market certainly seems dated and might even look as absurd. "So you just have to let those guys hit you back?"
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While there may be no excuse for the brutal nature of old-timey warfare, turn-based systems in gaming were certainly born out of necessity – technological limitations confined games to blocky pixels and simple animations. This, however, did not mean these games weren't worth your time. Instead, turn-based fighting allowed for a great deal of depth to be imparted in these early games and laid the foundation for the many memorable RPG's that, at a time, held a far greater presence in the market. Maybe I'm just bitter at the fact that my insatiable thrist for classic RPG goodness has taken a backseat in the gaming community, but it seems to me that there are a few good reasons to maintain this genre, and some others that point to why these games are beginning to lose appeal.
To start with the former reasoning, turn-based systems helped foster some pivotal elements in game creation. Even in their infancy, early RPG's led the way in character refinement, giving you a team of characters to develop into a strategic force. As their popularity grew, these games got bigger. A lot bigger. Years of production and development were put into these new epics. Soon, games were consuming multiple discs, and contained meticulously refined cutscenes and dialogue that drove the plotlines and character relationships, putting a new emphasis on story. These were the games that people could not wait to delve into, sinking hours of exclusive time into their completion.
This is where the latter reasoing comes into play. Today's popular games favor a pick-up-and-play mentality. Whether it's slingshotting angry birds on our smartphones to kill some time or burning through team deathmatches online, a great portion of gaming happens in brief stints. Even gaming marathons are, more often than not, an amalgamate of these reptitious cycles of sprint-style gaming (try turning off your Xbox before 2 AM after putting in COD). 
I'm not against these games, they've certainly created an enormous market and have enthralled millions, I just simply don't want to watch my single player experience obscured in the process, and that is really what the turn-based system represents to me. Can I grab a controller by myself and work through Halo's campaign? Of course. But that is certainly not where the intended experience lies. Even the Final Fantasy franchise has abandoned the format, and while this may represent a fresh new take on a timeless genre, it's also certainly the end of an era.
For me, turn-based games reflect a simplier time. Games focused on single player experiences, crafting impossibly deep stories and loads of content to be meticulously unearthed. New experiences of this nature call to mind God of War and the like, but sometimes to me, these can feel like speed-reading through a Faulkner novel. I won't give up just yet, and I hope we can all take the time to slow things down once in a while, neglect our lust for uber-stimulation and instant gratification, and let ourselves take a hit once in a while.