I have been playing since around 1983, so I have hit this wall as well. I notice it more with modern game design making every gamer a freaking encyclopedia of pluses and minuses. The games begin "feeling" more like everyone trying to maximize the perfect character. No matter what people state about back-story, the math starts taking us all over, obsessive to some, without even realizing it. How many short spear wielding, gnome paladins are running around? No matter the system I kept focusing on maximizing the build. It just gets redundantly boring.
I, for better or worse, began randomly selecting my characters. I would count up my playable race options and roll, class options roll, etc. Stats can still be built, but it reignited the fun factor for me. My characters became a heck of a lot more entertaining when I was able to develop an awesome back story to explain what the heck my paper birthed before me. And since the characters have not been fleshed out by the mountain of gamers out there, they always seemed to hold a little more excitement in and out of combat.
If it is just about "feeling", see if it is about how you look at the numbers on the sheet or the fun of Cheetos and Mountain Dew fermenting in the belly during that last vital hour of game play.