Sure they did.
Granted, since games were generally tied to hardware, it was much harder to issue small changes (like a game patch) but a number of games would have changes made by switching consoles; one port to another port to another port to another port (compare Arcade TMNT to home versions or Double Dragon games from pc to console) or even a semi-sequels where other changes were made, but the game was then sold/played completely new, so players had to buy a new copy/version.
How many variations of street fighter 2 are there? All of the versions change something; some might add characters or speed or super moves, but the ‘game’ changed. Even if one wanted to assert that the ‘owned’ copy wasn’t going to change, board switching was a thing for arcade cabinets too and some people even made homebrew changes (street fighter rainbow being the best example of hack changes influences the core game over time)
Sure, if you have an old cartridge of a game and plug it in now, it’s probably still the same (though age and dust can cause glitching and erratic behavior so the game isn’t ‘the same’) but even virtual console versions can vary by having different load times, removing some bugs or exploits; and what you may have had for the game may not have been the first released version of the game. Zelda LttP on the SNES has been made rather infamous in the speedrunning and mod communities that use a japanese-only version of the game so they can have specific glitches and exploits that didn’t happen in the US version.
Even some NES-era games may have just reskinned a release into something else to disguise the ‘changes’ that they made.
Yea, we can understand what you ‘meant’, but a lot of games have changed and with speedrunning or romhack communities, those games see new life because they change (esp if it’s rebalances and QoL adjustments and not just new exploits and yada yada)