I came to the conclusion this morning that there are things you can't do in an unscripted, collaborative story. Generally. The aesthetic of "The Wanting Comes In Waves / Repaid", off of the Decemberists album The Hazards of Love, made me think of it. It's just not the sort of story you can tell when everyone has a vested interest in some character being a hero. A boy, pleading with his mother for mercy and freedom. She, elegant and powerful as a queen, furious that he could even ask such a thing, lords her power over him, mocking his love for Margaret, forcing him to repay her for the slightest courtesy. Players would never stand for it.
This is why there will always be a place for despotic, planned, fiction from a single author. There's just things you can't do, otherwise. I see no particular reason why it was ever in danger of dying out, but it firms my respect for the form.
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