The prior assertions were that Fate was a narrative game with a strong a implication that it was also rules lite based on the subject of the thread. I offered Dresden Files as a counterpoint. I'm not sure what's surprising about that.
You should have offered Dresden Files RPG as a counterpoint to the person who made the argument rather than to me. If you are responding to me, then you should be engaging my post and not to someone else's. I am not that other person. Don't respond to me as if I were another person making that other argument. I'm not sure what is surprising about expecting that people showcase basic netiquette, Reynard.
Dresden Files RPG and Spirit of the Century represent the 3rd edition of Fate. Fate Core/Accelerated/Condensed are all the 4th edition versions of the game. Fate Condensed can even be thought of as (quintessentially) the polished version of Fate Core going forward. Fundamentally all contemporaneous versions and iterations of the game all use 4th Edition as the basis for their games, and the latter are generally what most people are talking about when discussing Fate.
This is not to say that they are not rules heavy Fate games (e.g., upcoming Chronicles of the Future Earth by Sarah Newton), but, rather, that the core game mostly isn't particularly mechanically heavy in common practice. Fate Accelerated is approximately 50 pages, and Fate Condensed is less than 70 pages. Dresden Files Accelerated is much lighter than Dresden Files RPG, though still crunchier than standard Fate Accelerated due to the addition of ritual magic and playbook-like Mantles. But the core gameplay is pretty narrative focused, and I think that attempting to circumvent that through arguing "Aspects notwithstanding" dismisses a fairly significant part of how that narrative and fiction first play transpires through the creation of and interaction with fictional tags.
In addition, it was explicitly stated that what divided traditional from narrative games was the capacity for the player to state a fact and the GM not having any ability to mitigate that. By its own rules, Fate explicitly does not work that way, which I pointed out. I'm not sure what's surprising about that.
First, I'm not particularly interested in what someone else explicitly stated other than what you have explicitly stated.
By its own rules, Fate explicitly applies "fiction first" principles. If someone is stating a fact or something about the fiction that causes the GM to say "no," it's generally the result of incongruent fiction or indication that the fiction needs to be negotiated at the table among the participants. Similarly, PbtA games generally work by "say yes or roll the dice," but a GM would likely still say "ummm....no..." if a player in the middle of an open prairie said, "I swing from the chandelier" because there is likely some misaligned fiction at play here. I don't think it's a reasonable conclusion, therefore, to assert that PbtA is a Traditional game.
If you are declaring a story fact or detail as a player, then this requires invoking an Aspect. Generally when I see this rule criticized or misused, the person ignores the fact that it has to be tied to one of the PC's Aspect. So a GM saying "no" in this regard usually means that either (1) the rule isn't being followed or (2) it lies outside of the plausible scope of the fiction. If it's the latter, then Fate also says that the GM may ask the player to revise their story detail. But the latter is also different than a flat out "no."
Again, the fact that the GM is the final arbiter of the rules does not somehow determine whether a game is a narrative game or not. The GM is the final arbiter of the rules in Cortex Prime, Powered by the Apocalypse, and Forged in the Dark games as well, but these games also lean more towards what people often regard as more narrative-focused games than traditional games. I think that one of the key points for what people often regard as narrative focused games is ability for players to negotiate the fiction with the GM, whether as a result of game mechanics or stated game principles, with the acknowledgment that the distinction between rules and principles can be be quite blurry for games (and sports).
That players get to narrate some stuff that happens in the game can't be the definition of a "narrative game" because literally every RPG ever explicitly allows players to narrate stuff. So it has to be something else. Fate has systemetized the process but it still isn't anything different than what has happened in every D&D game ever since 1974.
If Fate was as Traditional of a game as you say, I doubt that we would see so many people who prefer Traditional games like D&D constantly complain about Fate being different from their preferred play style (e.g., Old School, Traditional, Neo-Traditional, etc.) as much as they do, particularly on this forum. The difference between the games amounts to more than players getting to narrate stuff. A big part of those differences is how, why, and where as well as the respective power balance of GM and players in this regard. So I don't think that your superificial comparisons are particularly helpful or insightful.
Player: I fire a flaming arrow at the hay piles the bandits are hiding behind in the stables so they catch fire.
DM: Roll to hit. [Success] Okay, the hay catches fire and now there's smoke and flame everywhere.
Player: Great. [To other players] Let's use the smoke for cover to get out of here!
That is literally no different than Fate's "create advantage." There just weren't words for it in 1974.
@Ovinomancer did a good job of addressing this rectionistic comparison already.
