I wonder how these designers think a shield wall works... :-P

Has any game featured parrying daggers? They'd make more intuitive sense with such a mechanic than a shield.

I like it, it's a staple in many hack and slays. It's better (imho) than pressing the dodge button a dozen times. :P
Onimusha, God of War, Devil May Cry and countless others feature perfect blocks and most of the time it's implemented well, as in you have other options than blocking. :)

Dork Souls?

I honestly like it, although sometimes devs should show more leniency. Frame-perfect human inputs are not fun.

I think it's best not to have a dodge button. Instead, a player can dodge attacks simply by not colliding into them.

In Dead Cells (if I recall correctly, if you don't do a perfect block, you'll take partial damage), it pretty much ensured that I never used shields (the timing was rather unforgiving).

My time is limited enough that I can't justify spending a lot of it honing "mindless" skills (getting insanely accurate timing down to a T just doesn't work a part of my brain that is extremely useful for me in my life... maybe if I was a boxer or something like that, it would be more interesting).

However, in Dead Cells, shields aren't mandatory (just one out of many possible equipment combos) so it doesn't detract too much from the game.

I, too, have tired of very narrow precise inputs. Especially things like you describe for 'perfect blocking'. They make games not just actually tiring to play, but inaccessible to many. And too many games are done to rely on the expectation the player has mastered it and reliably does it.

That's the difference between a game and an interactive story unless the game is poorly balanced but then that's where cheats or trainers can help.

The Surge 2 has nice mechanic wherein blocking directionally at the right time produces a stagger. Regular blocks just drain your stamina, but prevent damage. Missing a directional block attempt provides no protection.