Why is chess so obsessed over?

I think the doctrine is that a really good chess player is like eisntein level of genius. That's been my notion in middle school. Idk if that's an actual widely held stereotype. I saw a photo of a 3 y/o 1500 ELO kid standing with Magnus. Cool, so he's the next goat. That's great. But isn't guess just a video game? Why do we praise it for it's intelligence? It's cool and fun but it's literally just a game that people dedicate their entire lives towards.