It's mostly marketing and a built in mic. Ever since I got a mic on an arm and good headphones though, that's all I want to use.

Because "gaming" headphones often aren't "just" headphones. They are headsets with a built-in boom mic

And a boom-mic is often way better than a crap wire mic or bluetooth headphone non boom mic.

There are still the trash ones, but there are also very good ones.

And a built-in mic is extremely useful on multiple situations : console gaming, tight space gaming (no place for a mic), or when there is only a single port on a device (tho a splitter, or hub could be used for a jack port or usb). There is also the convenience of just having a mic.

The issue now with all these headsets being "gaming", is because of the marketing.

Some headphones brands have put mics on theirs, to make them headsets :

Beyerdynamic with the mx300 : the tight clamp makes it a bit of a no go for me. The mic is as just between ok and great. The voice is full, but there is a lot of noise in there from the reviews I saw.

Audio technica : they have multiple of them. Latest one the ath-m50xsts. It looks like a circum aural headset, but is not. It's a on ear headset with ear isolation like a circum aural. Which is pretty bad for me. Tho the mic is the best I've ever heard on a headset.

They are both wired only.

And other brands not marketing as "gaming" headsets are either extremely expensive with strange mics, or have most of their production budget into audio and they pair the headphone with a trash mic to make it a headset.

In gaming headset brands, there are multiple ones providing software, mic, and wireless features enhancing the experience of the user. For example low latency high bandwidth wireless (proprietary, wifi-like 2.4ghz) connexions only exist in gaming branded headphones/sets. (high bandwidth = higher than bluetooth for the same latency).

RGB!!

More seriously, "gaming headphones" are almost always actually "gaming headsets", ie they have a mic. Good music headphones without a mic don't fulfil the requirements of quite a lot of gamers, and normal headsets are usually calibrated for voice and not immersiveness in games.

We do have sound cards in the form of DACs at least

Not having to deal with a sound card driver anymore has been a highlight of my year. Just get a dac and amp

Can we have sound cards again, now please?

I'm happy with my FIIO, works great with my beyerdynamics and no separate driver needed

Literal decades ago I bought Sennheiser headphones. They were great. They later orders of magnitude longer than anything I had before. They fit well, and were foldable, making them very compact when not used. And they were cheap too.

When they finally broke down I naturally wanted Sennheiser again, but they referred me to their new brand Epos. I bought a headset this time, not just headphones. It was a lot more expensive, and I was terribly disappointed by the ergonomics. It’s also rather big, making it unwieldy when not in use. And they broke already, though I was able to fix it - they broke just out of warranty of course.

Of course this is just one anecdote, but it really does feel like another great brand sold out and became crap.

There's plenty of ease of use with headphones though, I got a pair of sennheiser gaming headphones and flipping up to mute is convenient.

I disagree, unless it's the modmic, there are enough people who either don't have the space nor want to spend the money to properly place the mic (ie as near their face as possible). I'd rather they use some mediocre headset mic then place something that'd be otherwise decent like a Samson Go on a tiny tripod on the table next to their gaming keyboard, 20-30 cm away from their mouth.

There's a case for low latency wireless headphones, and it's pretty gaming specific. But yeah, they don't need the branding or any of that.

I'd rather they bring out some nice open back bluetooth headphones. Much better imaging, which is great both for music and shooters, and more comfortable for a lot of us. I just want the convenience of wireless, I don't need ANC.

Maybe Audeze will do it with a Maxwell stable mate.

I had a similar issue recently with not being able to plug my phone in to my car headphone jack so I bought a headphone jack to USB c cable. Works pretty well

Then again, headphones without active electronics should last 10-30 years.