Are we really going to talk about what does or does not feels realistic […]
I mean i get it, its covenient excuse ...
But please, dont try to pretend its anything else than excuse. -_-
Aristotle said works of fiction should favor probable impossibilities over improbable possibilities. Suspension of disbelief covers the big, crazy things like spiderman or aliens or wizards. But the audience still expects the mundane, background things to function according to intuition : just because superman can fly, doesn’t mean he drinks his coffee cold. That would be weird.
Video games aren’t like other works of fiction because they rely on abstract simulations. Hit points, or lives, have been around forever and never really made sense. Why does the last bullet you take kill you when all the others did basically nothing? The reason HP works in the player’s mind, I’d argue, is because it measures distance to failure intuitively. Take a hit, get closer to failing. Grab a medkit, buy yourself some breathing room.
I think that the abstraction of health points works only if it doesn’t stretch suspension of disbelief to improbable possibilities. Healing Word, Cure Wounds, Goodberry, sure! That’s what this world is all about. But no believable world has characters eating during intense exercise unless they’re looking for stomach cramps. It’s possible, but improbable.
