You’re not alone, Chris.

One on-line reviewer writes that “One common criticism that has been directed at [Overlord] is that [...] when you send troops to a planet to do battle with the enemy, you don’t actually see the damage they inflict on the enemy”.

Meanwhile, a ZZAP!64 reviewer complained about Kennedy Approach, “there’s not a lot to keep you interested for long, especially as you can’t even make planes collide in mid air or even blow up! Perhaps an air traffic disaster program would be a touch more interesting.”

re: “How could that be any fun?”

It couldn’t. I couldn’t find the string “blow stuff up” in this post. Are you sure you’re remembering the enjoyability of these so-called video games correctly?