For me, I saw the cTrix gAtari 2600 video late 2013 and immediately thought "oh my god I have to play around with this" because I hadn't made anything musical in about 8 years at that point. I picked up some VSTis and played around with samples in Renoise, eventually picked up LSDj before coming around to Nanoloop where I found my stride.
Making chip music is now an addiction. I make something every single day. I buy odd equipment (such as my yamaha fb-01) because I just want more interesting sounds. Everybody makes terrible big room house or brostep or butt rock or trance using big expensive programs and equipment, so making something with what little I had and expanding from there is what keeps me going and going and going and going and going and going and going and going...and going.
I guess that can be summarized by saying "low barrier for entry, low original cost, low relative maintenance and the allure of minimalism as well as art through adversity."