when did 12gb/16gb of vram become "required" and why?

Getting back into PC hardware news and to my surprise channels like hardware unboxed and i think gamers nexus have beent alking about how 12 or 16gb of VRAM is the new normal or required amount of vram for PC gamers

When did this happen? The last time i was into current hardware 8gb of vram was totally fine. I am rocking a 2070super (8gb vram) and I havnt noticed any problems, though I havnt played very many new games from the past couple years

is it true? do gamers need 12+gb of vram now?

also why? is it just games have become vram hungry or is it features like dlss/fsr / frame generation that eat up the vram?

thanks for any light anyone can shed on this for me

*im getting lots of comments that arent directly answering my questions, im not after opinions about low end cards, im not looking for pc buying advice. i just purely want to know why the sudden jump in vram requirements?