I wasn't really sure how to phrase the title so I apologize if it doesn't make sense. What I mean by it is I have noticed that now a days, people are less inclined to enjoy the "here and now" of games, and are now more focused on that next level. I remember back in 1st and 2nd edition our group, and other groups we played with, were more focused on enjoying the present adventure whether it was published or homemade and less worried about what our characters were going to get next level. I say it started around 3rd edition with the introduction of Prestige Classes because you were essentially granted a new ability at every level, and got really bad around 4th edition because of all the many powers and power combos. In my own experience, I have seen a lot of people see adventures as just a "grind" and they just want to hurry up, kill everything, and collect the XP so they can level up. It's like these people just can't wait to get to that sweet spot. What happened to enjoying the moment in the adventure instead of just looking forward to that next level? I have even seen mechanics and game design that tries it's best to try and speed things up. It's like the game wants you to hurry up, get through your current character and move on to the next one. I understand that some people only meet for a certain number of hours but not everyone has to worry about this. The game has even lowered the numbers for experience needed to gain levels.
All I ask is what's the rush?
How much of this is changing perceptions, rather than changing inclinations? Perhaps people were just as inclined to focus on the next level before, and you simply weren't as observant back then.
Perhaps there were just as many people who preferred a fast pace back then, and for whatever reason none of them happened to interact with your groups.
If it is in fact a change, then there could be any number of reasons, and there's probably nearly as many reasons as there are individuals.
In the end, though, this is something that's both a matter of personal preference (there's nothing wrong with preferring a slow pace to a fast pace, or vice versa, or even no levelling at all, as long as everyone at the table is happy) and something that is trivially easy for every campaign to adjust to suit.
Many of us no longer pay any attention to the written rules regarding levelling pace, as covered in various topics about XP over the years. Some people level based on hours of play, or number of sessions, or (like myself) when they feel the events of the campaign justify it. There's any number of approaches that can work. If you insist on using hard numbers, you can easily multiply the base values by whatever factor you want to slow the pace, or do the opposite to speed things up. Or add more XP-granting opportunities, or take them away. Whatever suits your needs best.
---
As a player ... I like having mechanical options. D&D tends to parcel these out over several levels. If I'm playing a class that starts with a low number of mechanical options, then sure, I'd prefer a fairly fast pace to get to the point where I have a sufficient number of viable options to suit my tastes. Once we've reached that point, though, I'm in no particular hurry at all.
Which leads me to the conclusion that were a campaign to
start at a level where I had sufficient mechanical options to suit my tastes (or if the system itself were to provide such from the first level), then I'd probably not really care if we never levelled at all, absent other reasons for levelling.