Are junk items important?

I was re-living the early days of gaming by watching some famous music videos and one of them hit me with a thought, Junk items actually add something of value to a game.

Junk items are useless knick-knacks scattered around the game world that could be seen as 'filler' items. They hold no purpose, sell for practically zero game currencies, and needless clutter the players inventory. So what's the point?

I think it has to do with world building. These small, useless items help give the player a sense of the world they are exploring and shows the player what the inhabitants of the world use in their day to day lives.

Am I getting too Meta or Philosophical? Probably. But I always wondered why junk items often held a description while other rarity items, besides 'legendary items, lacked a description.

Description on an item indicates its importance and for only junk items and legendary items to usually hold a description should give an indication on what status level junk items have.

It may sound silly to call junk items 'important' but they are added to a game for a reason, even if they have no use to the player.

I've never been a hoarder of 'knick knacks' in real life, but in gaming I seem to always find a junk item that I have to bring along my journey.

I've found some unique junk items to be a novelty and would usually store it in a bank or just lug it around in my inventory. It had no purpose but whatever the item was or what the description held, I found it amusing enough to assign it a spot to glance at while I manage my game storage.

In regards to world building, Not every NPC is going to have a 'potion' or 'Ultra killsaber' in their drawer, That would be ridiculous and would make me grow suspicious of the inhabitant. But to see random crap in their home is par for the course

I don't mind junk items as much anymore. They add to the game world and sometimes a game does add a function to them, like Fallout 3 and the 'rock-it launcher'.

I need to gather images to add and create my "famous" 'Crappy Paint' Title image but I needed to write this out first before the thought left me.

If this was read before I added the images, tell me your thoughts on junk items in games. I would be interested to read your comments!