They were even more dead before, and Thaler was introduced as a (halfhearted?) effort to try and revive them, by giving a rotating spotlight on one particular minigame. Of course now that there is a spotlight, it is a waste - from the perspective of the metagame - to play any minigame that is not currently spotlighted. The problem with the new FoG rewards is that they are too little, too late. Most of them have very little or no use. For example consider fire runecrafting gloves: if you wanted to runecraft for experience, you would be much better off just playing Runespan instead. And if you wanted profit, you would likely have better options or not be so concerned about every last XP.