Nope, they weren’t. But there were definitely differences whether you played on a Sony Trinitron or a cheap TV. Hell, I even played some games on black-white-TV when the color TV wasn’t available.

Can someone explain to me why this shootdown is even news instead of a statistic?

It’s a military airplane shot down in a shooting war. Does Russia now call the UN security council when Ukraine destroys a transport truck? Why is the media constantly falling for Russia’s bullshit behaviour?