Depending on what kind of game, I tend to have very different desires
and expectations.

When it's a board game or card game, I like things simple and clear.
Rules that boil down to fiat ("because that's what the book says") are
fine.  Games like this don't tend to model reality in any but the most
abstract sense, and some - like UNO or poker - are purely math and
skill, aside from the physical tokens used.

For RPGs, however, I prefer a mix of narrativist and simulationist.  The
gamist consideration of "a fair challenge for the players" is nice, but
I'm more concerned with presenting a consistent simulation of a reality
in which reasonable choices, strategies, etc can be made based on the
known facts and how things work - sometimes including intangibles, like
genre conventions - and, ideally, produce entertaining stories whether
the result is success, failure, or a mix of the two.  (It doesn't even
have to be /our/ reality - consider comic books where radiation gives
you super powers, or most SF where FTL travel exists in some form - as
long as it's internally consistent.)

In the first sort of game, I'm not going to blink if someone tells me I
can't move when it's not my turn, or a space on the board (or a border
between spaces) is impassible.  In the second, if you show me a map with
a line that represents a fence or ditch that only comes up to my
character's waist and insist that it is a hard boundary, I'm going to
have questions, and will probably not be satisfied with "because I/the
rules say so."

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Kelly St. Clair
xxxxxx@efn.org