IMO Mindstorms is a bit more of an all-in proposition; you have to build a thing that does a thing, and then build a "complete" program for it.
I never really got into Mindstorms either, I remember I would build a thing, then use the pre-loaded programs to run stuff, but then because I was starting from zero and didn't really have an understanding of what was going on, I wasn't able to really fiddle around very much.
With Python, it's easy to get something from very little- as is seen here from OP.
That was my experience with it, too. The feedback time is just too long for autodidactic play. Leetcode style stuff and hacking stuff together in Python? Fantastic.
That said, I did get really into Mindstorms when I went to summer camp that split the days between that in the morning and 3D modeling in the afternoons. Once the time was more structured, the feedback loop of "modify working code on a working robot and see what happens" was very fulfilling.
I never really got into Mindstorms either, I remember I would build a thing, then use the pre-loaded programs to run stuff, but then because I was starting from zero and didn't really have an understanding of what was going on, I wasn't able to really fiddle around very much.
With Python, it's easy to get something from very little- as is seen here from OP.