But beyond that, there IS a profound difference in the dynamics of play and experience between Trad games and Narrativist ones
At what point do you believe I specifically ever argued that there wasn't a difference?
Is it that one post where I stated that,
in the context of their respective games, Story Now isn't too dissimilar from the GM Railroad?
Granted, there was a whole supporting argument in that post inbetween when I said the latter and when I specifically said it was in the context of their respective games, but I'm sure you read the post in its entirety before commenting on what I said, especially after I pointed this out to you once before.
And sure, available play time matters, but that also fundamentally puts some barriers up in regards to how you can fairly judge one game in comparison to another.
For example, Go-Fish typically is a much shorter playing card game than a full set of Texas Hold'Em, assuming you're playing till somebody has the entire pot anyway. But you can't really compare the two. We might objectively say Go Fish is simpler and doesn't require much thought compared to Hold'Em, but at the same time they serve completely different audiences. Go Fish is mostly a kids game. Texas Hold'Em is the most popular card game in the world and is specifically gambling centric in its audience.
To compare them at is completely out of pocket and does both games a disservice.
However, coming back to RPGs, its not something we can necessarily ignore that the narrative games only came to exist as a reaction to more trad style games, and like it or not, trad game people aren't the ones who fired on the proverbial Fort Sumpter when it comes to toxic discourse and impressing specific game styles over another.
There may have been a lot of that amongst gaming groups back in the 80s or 90s, but it was never a centralized thing like what we saw the Forge foster coming into the naughties and 2010s as their efforts cumulated primarily in what we see as the PBTA style of games.
If we want to take to the perspective that the games simply can't even be compared at all, then only way forward means
everyone needs to stop making comparisons, period.
And that includes in how we describe the games we're talking about. I shouldn't be making comparisons when I describe my game (i actually try my best not to, even if I'm burying it the usual discourse), nor the games I tend to prefer (which isn't actually all that many anymore).
And likewise, when a narrative person describes AW, Agon, etc, they can't doing any of that either.
I think theres something to be said for just speaking to what a game does, and not what we think it does, and there's a pretty clear distinction there. If I want to go back again and describe my living world concept, I'm not going to be making overtures to what I think it does. I can only describe what it literally does and how it works.
Thats why I'm always on about gameplay loops and mechanics, because that cuts through all the opinionation, intended or otherwise, and just focuses on what the game actually does.