Firstly, I probably wouldn't classify the work most of us do as "solving open-ended computer science problems" so I'm not trying to make a comparison to that work.

Secondly, I guess it stands out to me because I watch other people play the same addictive game and are unable to play at a high level for the same lengths of time. If it were just an addictive property of the game, we should expect to see thousands of tyler1's as we see thousands of heroin addicts. Since we do not, it makes me think that there's something special with him.