I would argue that Hitler's capture of Moscow would have yielded result scores different in both strategical significance and political, than Napoleon's, and it would have handed him a great advantage in 1942.
The strategic importance of the city was hundred-fold different. The Napoleonic wars was a time where the modern states first started engaging in national fights with significant casualty, but still continue the war effort. In this sense it was quite the first "modern" warfare, but the telecommunication technology was still in its infancy; scout messengers were still used and reconnaissance was still relatively rudimentary. Gathered information was a fraction of what the Wehrmacht could gather, and it meant the control center relied on smaller Staff office. Combine it with Napoleon's providential talent, you could essentially have a mobile command center and the army could still function. In 1940s the sheer amount of intel and volume of telecommunication wouldn't be handled by no other place than central capital. Imagine if Napoleon couldn't dispatch orders in time and get the intels that he needed. Moscow needed to be taken specifically because taking it would have damaged Russian effort more than it did in Napoleonic times.
Note that in Napoleonic invasion Russian army set Moscow ablaze and left them to an empty city; in the Barbarossa they were willing to defend it to last man. Even Stalin refused to move away. Production prowess of modern city Moscow wasn't also nothing to scoff at, too.
Von Clausewitz did write that war is a political means(I remember this from first few chapters from On War, though I forgot which translation I read) and one of the primary goals must be to 1) preserve one's own strength, while 2) deteriorate the opponent's fighting capability. Taking Moscow would have done exactly that. It also would have yielded a political gain, as Soviet army at the time was heavily dependent on a few personnel, especially after the Great Purge. Once you take Moscow and demean Stalin's infallibility, you also damage Soviet morale.
I too believe that most of the battles are determined before the engagements. We know of the contrarian ones because they are rare. German generals(Model, Manstein, Rundstedt, Guderian to name a few) were perhaps the most competent ones in the second world war, but they hardly get mentions. (Perhaps deservingly for the ends they were aiming at)