Remove the abstractions applied and life is simple: consume. Consume to live. Consume to get stronger. Consume until you die. Not wrongly, as all life is structured around this eternal fight for energy. Our species consciousnesses was evolved to increase our capability and efficiency for consumption. And yet, there in lies the fatal flaw for with consciousnesses we unlocked hunger for that which was not yet created. Therefore, we began to create, something which that holy biological optimization engine did not intend. Sages 21:6
As gamers, it is our god given right to play, is it not? For play we must, as by playing we give work form by natural opposition. It must be that play is what we so strive for through our work. "Work hard, play hard" my father once told me, multiple times. Yet, as form is evaporated by the heat of modernity, what are we left with? As gamers are boiled down into people, what sweetness is left behind?
Games present not an avenue of play but instead a horrifying chimera canvas. The developer must form the frame, stretch the cotton, even paint their full picture perhaps. But in the end, they are only an assistant to the true artisans: gamers. I am not sure that games can ever truly be art, as that canvas, by definition, is left unfilled. It seems wrong to release the worlds largest paint by numbers, expecting the players to fill in the lines. What is truly gained from tracing those shapes; this changes nothing, creates nothing.
Instead, should developers not embrace their true role and simply try to prepare the best canvas possible? Certainly, fill in the canvas if you want, but don't call it a game. Try as you might, you cannot impart experiences truly. Let the developer create something that stands above all else as a canvas for expression. And yet, we expect expression to be so varied it is impossible to prepare for. So we should not.
Thus, I leave you (for now) with this. If you must paint, do not pretend. Make your composition. This is what is given to you. Most of all tell your story. But if you want to create, do not pretend. When the gift you give is not your story, let it be a canvas.
(I think I was responding to 6.1 here, its all a bit of a mess right now. I think I'm going to go sleep.)